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| How can we tackle hate crime with four school systems? | How can we tackle hate crime with four school systems? |
| (10 days later) | |
| Exactly what did Theresa May mean when she determined to “strengthen the union of the four countries of the United Kingdom” as one of the 12 essential requirements of a successful Brexit? Tempting though it is to assign her words to a banalities basket, along with “Brexit means Brexit”, perhaps it was more than that. | Exactly what did Theresa May mean when she determined to “strengthen the union of the four countries of the United Kingdom” as one of the 12 essential requirements of a successful Brexit? Tempting though it is to assign her words to a banalities basket, along with “Brexit means Brexit”, perhaps it was more than that. |
| Could it have been a coded way of acknowledging there is a job to be done in healing the wounds of a nation so divided by the strong feelings of the leave-or-remain debate that it has led to a significant increase in crimes born of xenophobia and racism? To heal those is an urgent necessity to retain our claim to be civilised. | Could it have been a coded way of acknowledging there is a job to be done in healing the wounds of a nation so divided by the strong feelings of the leave-or-remain debate that it has led to a significant increase in crimes born of xenophobia and racism? To heal those is an urgent necessity to retain our claim to be civilised. |
| Most developed countries seek to do that, and to secure their economic wellbeing in an increasingly uncertain world, through their educational systems, especially their schools. They re-emphasise long-established and agreed educational purposes. But in the case of the UK, there are none. | Most developed countries seek to do that, and to secure their economic wellbeing in an increasingly uncertain world, through their educational systems, especially their schools. They re-emphasise long-established and agreed educational purposes. But in the case of the UK, there are none. |
| This comes as a surprise to most people. The reality, however, is that Scottish, Welsh, Northern Irish and English schools march to different drumbeats – increasingly divergent after the establishment of the Welsh Assembly, Scottish Parliament and Stormont in 1998. Even though their pupils emerge with the same right to call themselves citizens of the UK, they do so under very different dispensations. | This comes as a surprise to most people. The reality, however, is that Scottish, Welsh, Northern Irish and English schools march to different drumbeats – increasingly divergent after the establishment of the Welsh Assembly, Scottish Parliament and Stormont in 1998. Even though their pupils emerge with the same right to call themselves citizens of the UK, they do so under very different dispensations. |
| Different exam and testing systems, different school inspection regimes, different rules for school admissions and widely divergent school curriculums mean almost nothing unites our future citizens’ schooling experience. | Different exam and testing systems, different school inspection regimes, different rules for school admissions and widely divergent school curriculums mean almost nothing unites our future citizens’ schooling experience. |
| In England, there are academies and free schools and a sprinkling of university technical colleges (UTCs) and studio schools; in the other three countries, there are none. A key feature of English schools is the vital supervisory role of governing bodies; in Scotland there are no governors. Secondary schools in Wales and Scotland are almost entirely organised along comprehensive lines; in Northern Ireland there is a selective system dominated by the Catholic and Protestant churches and in England a hybrid arrangement depending in which part of the country you live. | In England, there are academies and free schools and a sprinkling of university technical colleges (UTCs) and studio schools; in the other three countries, there are none. A key feature of English schools is the vital supervisory role of governing bodies; in Scotland there are no governors. Secondary schools in Wales and Scotland are almost entirely organised along comprehensive lines; in Northern Ireland there is a selective system dominated by the Catholic and Protestant churches and in England a hybrid arrangement depending in which part of the country you live. |
| It might be argued that apart from the curriculum issue, these differences don’t matter. Certainly, there is precious little apparent impact when it comes to international tests such as Pisa, where at four-year intervals there is no significant difference in pupil outcomes except that Wales is adrift at the bottom of the home nations – and that may be mainly down to school funding, which is worst in Wales by far. | It might be argued that apart from the curriculum issue, these differences don’t matter. Certainly, there is precious little apparent impact when it comes to international tests such as Pisa, where at four-year intervals there is no significant difference in pupil outcomes except that Wales is adrift at the bottom of the home nations – and that may be mainly down to school funding, which is worst in Wales by far. |
| But curriculum does matter. Surely there should be agreement, however generally expressed, about what skills and shared values we want our next generation to take on. Even “British values”, which in 2014 Westminster stipulated should underpin daily life in all schools, weren’t really shared. The clue lay in the requirement that all pupils should develop “respect for English [sic] law”. Schools in the other three countries know nothing about this version of “British values”. Nor do they all know of – still less pursue – the time-intensive Prevent training, allegedly essential in countering extremism. | But curriculum does matter. Surely there should be agreement, however generally expressed, about what skills and shared values we want our next generation to take on. Even “British values”, which in 2014 Westminster stipulated should underpin daily life in all schools, weren’t really shared. The clue lay in the requirement that all pupils should develop “respect for English [sic] law”. Schools in the other three countries know nothing about this version of “British values”. Nor do they all know of – still less pursue – the time-intensive Prevent training, allegedly essential in countering extremism. |
| Next weekend at a hotel near Edinburgh 20 teachers, five from each of the four countries, are getting together to examine two issues. The first is whether there should be some agreement across the UK about general purposes of the schooling systems. Apart from the motherhood-and-apple-pie ingredients of good citizenship and the desirability of bringing up youngsters to think for themselves and act for others, they will doubtless address the question of whether all four countries are too busily engaged in equipping young people for a world that no longer exists. | Next weekend at a hotel near Edinburgh 20 teachers, five from each of the four countries, are getting together to examine two issues. The first is whether there should be some agreement across the UK about general purposes of the schooling systems. Apart from the motherhood-and-apple-pie ingredients of good citizenship and the desirability of bringing up youngsters to think for themselves and act for others, they will doubtless address the question of whether all four countries are too busily engaged in equipping young people for a world that no longer exists. |
| The present English system, with its emphasis on the Ebacc, is so backward-looking that it ignores vital skills for the future, such as those implied by schools that adopt the internationally recognised European Computer Driving Licence (ECDL), enable opportunities for coding and familiarise their pupils with a digitalised world where automation is accelerating changes in job opportunities. Such schools, and they are rare, emphasise teamwork and solving inter-disciplinary problems, and pay attention to the mental and physical wellbeing of their students. Governments, however, stubbornly remain in the Luddite camp, as demonstrated only last week by the DfE disallowing ECDL as an approved qualification counting towards a school’s score in exam league tables. | The present English system, with its emphasis on the Ebacc, is so backward-looking that it ignores vital skills for the future, such as those implied by schools that adopt the internationally recognised European Computer Driving Licence (ECDL), enable opportunities for coding and familiarise their pupils with a digitalised world where automation is accelerating changes in job opportunities. Such schools, and they are rare, emphasise teamwork and solving inter-disciplinary problems, and pay attention to the mental and physical wellbeing of their students. Governments, however, stubbornly remain in the Luddite camp, as demonstrated only last week by the DfE disallowing ECDL as an approved qualification counting towards a school’s score in exam league tables. |
| That may bring the Edinburgh group, funded by the Paul Hamlyn Foundation, to consider the different school practices in the four countries and how they affect school communities and their pupils’ chances of successful outcomes. | That may bring the Edinburgh group, funded by the Paul Hamlyn Foundation, to consider the different school practices in the four countries and how they affect school communities and their pupils’ chances of successful outcomes. |
| Why, for example, are far more pupils permanently excluded in England than in Scotland? What can we learn from Northern Ireland, where there is a surplus in teacher supply while there is an acute shortage in many parts of the other three countries? Should there be a UK-wide set of professional learning opportunities and entitlements for teachers, without whose efforts there is little hope for our children’s futures? Why is there such a difference in respect for teachers across the UK? | |
| If the Edinburgh group sends a report of their findings to the four education ministers, it will be more in hope than expectation that ministers will compare notes. After all, they have never done so. Devolution in 1998 to Stormont, Holyrood and the Welsh Assembly, was to be welcomed and the subsidiarity that went with it: England remains the poor relation with its centralised system and weakened local government. If a sense of powerlessness is the enemy of democracy, England is more at risk than the other three countries. To compare notes nearly 20 years on from devolution would not be hasty although it would involve suspending for a brief period educational tourism to the far east and Scandinavia. | If the Edinburgh group sends a report of their findings to the four education ministers, it will be more in hope than expectation that ministers will compare notes. After all, they have never done so. Devolution in 1998 to Stormont, Holyrood and the Welsh Assembly, was to be welcomed and the subsidiarity that went with it: England remains the poor relation with its centralised system and weakened local government. If a sense of powerlessness is the enemy of democracy, England is more at risk than the other three countries. To compare notes nearly 20 years on from devolution would not be hasty although it would involve suspending for a brief period educational tourism to the far east and Scandinavia. |
| If there is any ambition to preserve the UK as an entity, schools have an essential role to play. It is hard to think of anywhere else that has abandoned schools as a key means of nation building. Post Brexit, it will be interesting to see if that ambition exists in the four countries of the UK. | If there is any ambition to preserve the UK as an entity, schools have an essential role to play. It is hard to think of anywhere else that has abandoned schools as a key means of nation building. Post Brexit, it will be interesting to see if that ambition exists in the four countries of the UK. |
| Sir Tim Brighouse is the former chief commissioner for schools | Sir Tim Brighouse is the former chief commissioner for schools |
| • This article was amended on 9 March 2017. An earlier version suggested that pupils cannot be excluded in Scotland, contrasting this with the situation in England. To clarify: they can be excluded in Scotland, but the rate of permanent exclusions, known as “removals from register”, is much lower than in England. |
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