In this article our central argument is that we should be promoting creative education and that this is a necessity, not an option. How creative education is applied by and to different individuals, groups of people, in different communities, institutions and societies, historically and culturally, is dependent on how the term ‘creativity’ is grounded, politicised, and practised. We are told that we need new thinking in the current world crises of economics and global environmental concerns. We are also told that in education, a new critically reflexive form of creativity is in order to address the task of the age of reconciling the need for a stable, safe, ethical and empathetic world within which a productive, adaptive and innovative workforce can operate. In this article we make a case and provide evidence from several projects for how artists-in-residence transform higher education and provide teachers and learners an excellent resource for exploring a creative paradigm to guide pedagogic practices.