51.890°N 2.078°W / 51.890; -2.078 Cheltenham Festivals is a registered charity^[1] that aims to bring joy, spark curiosity, connect communities, and inspire change year-round with four world-class festivals in Jazz, Science, Music, and Literature, and charitable programmes for education, community, and talent development in Cheltenham, Gloucestershire, England.

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A broad education and outreach programme sits at the heart of Cheltenham Festivals, delivering bespoke activities that extend the reach of each Festival and help to achieve the organisations aims of developing talent, engaging year-round with schools and the community and creating unique experiences. In 2017, 25,000 students took part in Cheltenham Festivals' school offer, as well as teachers from 246 schools.

The Education and Outreach programme comprises Festival-specific events and workshops that take place in the run up to and during the Festivals. Alongside these activities, six year-round programmes extend the four Festivals' engagement beyond the Festival boundaries. The programmes are

Beyond Words

Beyond Words reaches out from Cheltenham Literature Festival to young people in Gloucestershire who are temporarily unable to access mainstream schooling due to a severe mental or physical illness. Working with the Gloucestershire Hospital Education Service(GHES) the programme gives these students the opportunity to work over time with a writer-in-residence. Their work is professionally published in an anthology, and showcased at Cheltenham Literature Festival.

Reading Teachers = Reading Pupils

Reading Teachers = Reading Pupils aims to engender a love of reading in primary school pupils by increasing teachers' enthusiasm for and knowledge of high quality children's literature. Local networks of teachers' reading groups gives them the time and space to share children's literature so that they can use more whole novels in their teaching. As a result, their pupils read more, and standards are raised.

LabLive

LabLive takes the best of Cheltenham Science Festival on tour, presenting spectacular science to hundreds of year 8 and 9 students across the UK in a bid to inspire and engage inquisitive young minds. As well as enjoying science and maths at its most amazing, students learn more about the benefits of studying maths, technology, engineering and science at GCSE.

FameLab Academy

FameLab Academy is a science communication competition for year 9 students in local secondary schools. The students, supported by their teachers, prepare 3 minute presentations to explain a STEM topic in a dynamic and engaging way to a panel of judges whose assessment focuses on content, clarity and charisma. The winner from each school receives a Masterclass in communication skills, a work placement in a local STEM company, and entry into the Gloucestershire FameLab Archived 22 March 2018 at the Wayback Machine final.

Musicate

Musicate aims to inspire a love of music by giving children the skills to engage with unfamiliar genres of music. The programme brings primary school teachers and early career musicians together, and equips them with creative approaches to music education. In collaboration they produce vibrant music experiences for children throughout the academic year, and the musicians also have the opportunity to plan and present a bespoke concert for schools at the Cheltenham Jazz and Music Festivals.

Community Outreach

The Community Outreach programme encourages contribution and participation in cultural activities in order to positively impact on social exclusion, poverty, ill health and disadvantage. Cheltenham Festivals recognises the importance of making the arts accessible to people who struggle to engage. The first two phases have been embraced in a large neighbourhood in West Cheltenham where a concentration of relative poverty sets it aside from the rest of Cheltenham. The final phase, a community opera called A Likely Story, will begin in Spring 2018.

Cheltenham Festivals is responsible for the four festivals, which include two of the country's oldest. The first Music Festival was held in 1945 followed by a Literature Festival in 1949. These were augmented by the first Jazz Festival in 1996, followed by the Science Festival in 2002.

There is a commitment to produce festivals with 'attitude', 'bite' and 'edge', creating programmes that give audiences the opportunity to discover and participate in new and interesting work.^{[citation needed]} With the four festivals of Jazz, Science, Music and Literature, Cheltenham Festivals host hundreds of events across 12 months. The Festivals have combined ticket sales of more than 200,000.

Previously linked with the Cheltenham Borough Council, in 2006 the four festivals set out independently as they collectively became Cheltenham Festivals. As a registered charity, Cheltenham Festivals has its own marketing, education and development teams.