Ethnicity and education

• According to Gillborn and Youdell (2000), in one local education authority African Caribbean children were the highest achievers on entry to primary school, yet by the time it came to GCSE, they had the worst results of any ethnic group.
• To label someone is to attach a meaning or definition to them
• studies show that teachers often see black and Asian pupils as being far from the ‘ideal pupil’ • For example, black pupils are often seen as disruptive and Asians as passive. Negative labels may lead teachers to treat ethnic minority pupils differently
• The Swan Report [1985] recommended that schools should promote the idea of multicultural Britain because many schools were institutionally racist
• Ceclie Wright [1992] found that although teaching staff opposed racist views, they often had stereotypical attitudes that saw some children as problematic
• wright mentioned said that Asian girls tended to be seen as submissive and so were overlooked, whilst Black Caribbean boys were seen as of low academic potential that resulted in poor behaviour from boys
• Rosenthal & Jacobson (1968) found that when teachers believed some students would do well, these students did better than those who weren't expected to succeed
• Gillborn & Gipps [1996] found that teachers held negative images of Afro-Caribbean boys which led to lower expectations and less support than white boys
• Childline reported that in 2013, there were 1,400 children reporting incidents of racist bullying in schools
• Stuart Hall suggested that racism in schools led to a rejection of schooling by Black boys which he called a culture of resistance
• Gillborn found that teachers were quicker to discipline black pupils than others for the same behaviour • Gillborn and Youdell argue that this is the result of teachers’ ‘racialised expectations’
• gilborn and yodell found that teachers expected black pupils to present more discipline problems and misinterpreted their behaviour as threatening or as a challenge to authority
• Gillborn and Youdell conclude that much of the conflict between white teachers and black pupils stems from the racial stereotype's teachers hold, rather than the pupils’ actual behaviour
• Peter Foster (1990) found that teachers’ stereotypes of black pupils as badly behaved could result in them being placed in lower sets than other pupils of similar ability
• Cecile Wright’s (1992) study of a multi-ethnic primary school shows that Asian pupils can also be the victims of teachers’ labelling
• wright found that despite the school’s apparent commitment to equal opportunities, teachers held ethnocentric views: that is, they took for granted that British culture and Standard English were superior
• wright mentioned Asian pupils also felt isolated when teachers expressed disapproval of their customs or mispronounced their names. In general, teachers saw them not as a threat (unlike black pupils), but as a problem they could ignore. The effect was that Asian pupils, especially the girls, were marginalised pushed to the edges and prevented from participating full
• Williams argues that explanations of ethnic differences in achievement need to go beyond simply examining individual teacher racism to look at how schools and colleges routinely discriminating against ethnic minorities.
• From this point of view, the ethnocentric curriculum is a prime example of institutional racism
• Williams sees the meagre provision for teaching Asian languages as institutional racism because it is an example of racial bias being built into the everyday workings of schools and colleges.
• Studies of school governing bodies provide further examples of institutional racism. Richard Hatcher (1996) found that they gave low priority to race issues and failed to deal with pupils’ racist behaviour
• hatcher found that In the schools he studied, there were no formal channels of communication between school governors and ethnic minority parents. This meant, for example, that nothing was done about parents’ concerns over lack of language support
• Gillborn and Youdell found that Black minorities are more often found in lower sets in schools. The Swann report found systems in schools disadvantages some ethnic minorities. Exclusion rates are significantly higher for Black Caribbean children