Greenwich in South East London already features in education law history for the ‘Greenwich Judgement’ on school choice. Today, it seemingly avoided the possibly of creating a second precedent by accepting that it would not be in the interest of local people to spend money defending any legal action by the DfE on closing schools.
As usual, there are pros and cons to both the Council’s position and that of the government at Westminster. What is lacking is a clear understanding of guidelines that fit a changing set of circumstances. The BBC’s World at One programme interviewed the Leader of Basildon Council – a Tory – where several schools are closed because of very high rates of infection. He defended that situation.
Generally, opinion is that education is a ‘good thing’ and leaving parents to arrange childcare at short notice can cause problems that should be avoided if at all possible. All the current issues were foreseeable, and the present situation demonstrates the lack of cooperative planning that is the hallmark of the present administration, and might yet be its downfall.
The issues are the same, where infection leads to transmission to higher risks groups from lower risks groups there is a danger, but within lower risks groups it is less of an issue. This appears to be the case with university students that remain in a group and don’t interact with the wider community. Schools are different, by their very community nature.
Low income, multi-generational households, especially in the non-White community, remain at very high risk from the pandemic and it is understandable that schools can play a part in the chain of transmission. But low income families have less space for on-line learning even if they have access to the technology.
So, no easy answer. But a set of criteria
Local public health officials can assess the trends and liaise with schools and education officers. Where more than a certain level of infections are present, local officials should notify the DfE of intending closure of a group of schools and provide the evidence in the same as a single school would use and there shouldn’t be an issue.
Where it becomes complicated is the notion of a ‘preventative closure’ to try to stop a spike happening. Surely, by now, we have enough evidence to set some criteria for where it is appropriate to close schools, and where it is better to keep them open?
Even with the vaccination programme, it seems likely that next term is going to be a challenging one for schools, their pupils and for parents. The clearer the agreed guidelines the better.
Readers of this blog will know that in April I revisited an article I first wrote in 1996 about Equal Opportunities in Education.
In the 1996 article, I wrote that:
“It is clear that members of some ethnic groups are less likely to find places on PGCE courses than white applicants.” I added that “These figures are alarming” and that “If graduates with appropriate degrees are being denied places on teacher training courses in such numbers, much more needs to be known about the reasons why.” During the period 2008-2011, I was asked to conduct two, unpublished, studies for the government agency responsible for training teachers. Sadly, the conclusion of both studies was that little had changed in this respect.
In the April article that also considered the issue of gender and ageism in the training of graduates to become teachers I made the following points.
Fortunately, it seems as if more graduates from ethnic minority groups are now entering teaching. Data from the government’s annual census of teacher training reveals that between 2014/15 and 2018/19 the percentage of trainees from a minority ethnic group increased from 13% to 19% of the total cohort.
Table 5: Minority Ethnic Groups as a Percentage of Postgraduate Trainees
Postgraduate new entrants
Postgraduate percentages
Trainee Cohort
Total
Minority ethnic group
Non-minority ethnic group
Minority ethnic group
Non-minority ethnic group
2014/15
24893
3178
21715
13%
87%
2015/16
26957
3873
23084
14%
86%
2016/17
25733
3753
21980
15%
85%
2017/18
26401
4113
22288
16%
84%
2018/19
27742
4917
22825
18%
82%
2019/20p
27675
5168
22507
19%
81%
Source: DfE Initial Teacher Training Censuses
In numeric terms, this mean an increase of some 2,000 trainees from ethnic minority backgrounds during this period.
Although UCAS no longer provides in-year data about ethnicity of applicants, there is some data in their end of year reporting about the level of acceptances for different ethnic groups.
In the 1996 article, there was a Table showing the percentage of unplaced applicants to PGCE courses by ethnic groups in the three recruitment rounds from 1993 to 1995. What is striking about both that table, and the table below for the four years between 2014-2017 that presents the data on the percentages of ethnic groups accepted rather than unplaced, is that in both of the tables, graduates from the Black ethnic group fare less well than do White or Asian applicants. Indeed, the overwhelmingly large White group of applicants had the lowest percentage of unplaced applicants in the 1990s, and the highest rate of placed applicants in the four years from 2014-2017.
In the original article I noted that “39% of the Black Caribbean group [of applicants] accepted were offered places at three of the 85 institutions that received applications form members of this ethnic group. Thirty-nine out of the 85 institutions accepted none of the applicants from this group that applied to them.” Although we no longer have the fine grain detail of sub-groups within this ethnic grouping, nothing seems to have significantly changed during the intervening period.
Table 6: Percentage Rate of Acceptances for Postgraduate trainee Teachers
2014
2015
2016
2017
Asian
39
47
44
48
Black
27
34
30
35
Mixed
49
56
51
55
White
56
64
61
64
Other
31
38
37
39
Unknown
46
53
48
52
Source: UCAS End of Cycle reports.
Using the data from the government performance tables for postgraduate trainees, it seems that a smaller percentage of trainees from ethnic minorities received QTS at the standard time when compared to those from the non-minority community, with the percentages of those trainees both not awarded or not yet completing being greater for the trainees from the minority ethnic groups.
Table 7: Success of Postgraduate Trainee Teachers by Ethnicity
2017/18
Trainees
Percentage awarded QTS
Percentage yet to complete
Percentage not awarded QTS
Teaching in a state school
Percentage of those awarded QTS teaching in a state school
Ethnicity
Minority
4,311
88%
6%
6%
3,014
80%
Non-minority
22,861
92%
3%
4%
17,022
81%
Unknown
706
90%
4%
6%
503
79%
Source: DfE database of trainee teachers and providers and school Workforce Census
However, the percentage reported as working in a state school was similar at 80% for ethnic minority trainees and 81% for non-ethnic minority trainees. As there are no data for trainees working in either the independent sector or further education institutions including most Sixth Form Colleges, it isn’t clear whether the overall percentage in teaching is the same of whether or not there is a greater difference?
So what has changed in the profile of graduates training to be a teacher during the twenty years or so between 1997 and 2019? The percentage of trainees from minority ethnic groups within the cohort has increased. However we know their chances of becoming a teacher are still lower than for applicants from the large group of applicants classified as White as their ethnic group.
Ethnicity and Leadership
For some twenty years I compiled an annual report on the labour market for senior staff in schools. At the turn of the century questions about the ethnicity of candidates were included. In the report on the 2005-06 school year I wrote:
‘Two other issues we have highlighted over the past few years, where we believe urgent steps need to be taken are the recruitment of senior staff from ethnic minorities and for faith schools. We are especially concerned about the almost complete absence of appointments in the Special school Sector of any staff from amongst the ethnic minorities. … although the position seems to be a little better in the Primary and Secondary School Sectors, we are not convinced that enough is being done to recruit senior staff from amongst these groups.’
12th Report Labour Market for Senior Staff in schools 2005-06 prepared for NAHT and ASCL.
That was a typical comment of the period.
The NASUWT also commissioned a report into Black and Ethnic Minority Teachers from a team at the University of Manchester that was published as The Leadership Aspirations and Careers of Black and Minority Ethnic Teachers in January 2009. The text is available on Researchgate at https://www.researchgate.net/publication/242575423_The_Leadership_Aspirations_and_Careers_of_Black_and_Minority_Ethnic_Teachers The key message from that study was that at that time ethnic minority staff did not perceive the teaching profession to be inclusive. It would be interesting to know whether such feeling were still prevalent today.
The is no doubt that progress differs across the country, with some areas more forward in both understanding and tackling the issues that other areas where they have been seen of as less concern. Hopefully, the issue will once again see discussion and action to ensure all teachers are treated equally. However, that begs the question of what is meant by equally?
John Howson 