Tag Archives: Black Headteachers

Ethnic Minority Head Teachers: scant progress

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In October 2021, I wrote a blog about the number of ethnic minority head teachers ‘We need more black headteachers in our schools’ | John Howson (wordpress.com) I thought it was time to bring the data up to date.

YearEthnic minority Head teachers (including white minorities)
2015/20161,473
2016/20171,480
2017/20181,512
2018/20191,531
2019/20201,530
2020/20211,532
2021/20221,564
2022/20231,627

Source Annual School Workforce Census

Despite the increase of 63 in the total number of these head teachers between November 2021 and November 2022, and including all minority groups not classified as ‘White British’ in the total, there were apparently only 1,627 head teachers self-identified as from minority backgrounds in November 2022. This an increase of only around 10%, or just 154 additional head teachers from minority backgrounds, over the eight years represented in the table. There may be more, because the number that refused to answer the question increased from 117 to 192 during the same period.

During the same period, the total of ‘White’ head teachers only changed from 19,520 in November 2019 to 19,104 in November 2022.

There is better news on the ITT front, where ITT undergraduate entrants from minority ethnic groups increased from 12% to 17% of the total intake between 2019/2020 and 2022/2023. For those on postgraduate courses, the increase in the percentage was from 19% to 22% during the same period. However, I suspect that the distribution was skewed towards certain parts of the country. Sadly, we don’t easily have access to that data.

The discussion at the Select Committee last Tuesday about discrimination and unconscious bias meaning that more ethnic minority applicants were not offered places mirrored the finding from the two studies that I conducted for the then National College. Progress is being made, but slowly. My research also found that ethnic minority applicants fared better when there were fewer applicants to select from, as there was in most subjects last year. What will happen if the economy slows and the number of applicants for ITT increases once again?

Given that boys from an African Caribbean background do relatively poorly in our schooling system, it would also be interesting to know whether there is more of a challenge recruiting men form minority backgrounds than there is recruiting women and whether certain subjects struggle more than others? How many physics ITT recruits came for ethnic minority backgrounds in each of the last five years, and were they recruited mainly from a small number of courses. If they aren’t in the pipeline of learning then they won’t be there to become teachers of future generations.

For over a quarter of a century we have been urging women into science, engineering and other STEM subjects. Should we now look to do the same with other under-represented groups. As a large employer of graduates, does teaching have a responsibility to not just recruit graduates but also to influence the pipeline. After all that pipeline starts in schools.

‘We need more black headteachers in our schools’

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‘This blog was founded on the idea that data was important. Had the Labour government of Blair and Brown not abolished the mandatory qualification for headship, this issue of who becomes a head teacher would have been visible much earlier and more widely debated. Sadly, it has been relegated to regular research studies and the data that the DfE collects from the annual census of the workforce. The issue of ethnicity has been ignored for too long.

It may be the Workforce data that has convinced the Secretary of State to pay attention to the fact that of nearly 69,000 teachers recorded as from minority groups -including white minorities – only 1,530 were headteachers. Over the past few years, the number has barely altered.

yearEthnic minority Head teachers (including white minorities)
2015/161,473
2016/171,480
2017/181,512
2018/191,531
2019/20201,530
Ethnic Minority Headteacher Numbers- England

Derived from DfE School Workforce Data

Between the 205/16 school-year and the last school -year there were only 57 more headteachers from minority groups across all types of schools. The DfE data does allow evidence of where these headteachers are located.

Looking back at a Report that I wrote for the NAHT in 2001, I find that I said even then that:

‘it is of concern that in such a multi-cultural society as Britain has become, these posts are still so unrepresentative of the groups that make up that society.’

The same view appeared regularly in the future reports written for the NAHT during the remainder of that decade. It is, therefore, of interest that the secretary of State made his remarks to an NAHT Conference.

The Conference was told that less than 0.2% of school leaders were Black and female. Lack of black headteachers ‘not good enough’, says Education Secretary | Metro News

The data for appointments to headship in the first decade of the century can be found in Table 3 of The leadership aspirations and careers of black and minority ethnic teachers by Olwen Mcnamara, myself, Helen Gunter and Andrew Fryers. The research was conducted for the NASUWT and the then NCTL. The report still remains, along with the reports on entry to the profession conducted for the College, some of the most detailed research into the issues of ethnic minority teachers in England and their careers.

Most headteachers for ethnic minority backgrounds have been located in areas where there are higher concentrations of pupils with similar backgrounds. Thus, there are large areas of rural England where headteachers from ethnic minority backgrounds are rarely to be found, especially the further north and west from London the school is located.

To encourage headteachers from ethnic minority backgrounds there needs to be more teachers to fill the pipeline to leadership. The Secretary of State might like to consider the issue of recruitment into teaching now the DfE has full responsibility for managing the process.

Teaching must be representative of society as a whole. As I wrote in an article nearly 30 years ago, teaching must not become a profession that is ‘young, white and female’.