It has been revealed that under a Labour administration, students will no longer be expelled from school for misbehaviour.
Secondary schools in Southwark, South London, will permit misbehaving students to stay as long as they do not endanger the safety of another child, in what is thought to be a first for the UK.
Instead of taking the bad behaviour at face value, teachers will be urged to understand the causes behind it by using a “trauma-informed response.”
Following a 2020 report that revealed the council had a higher than average exclusion rate, all of the schools have ratified the agreement.
The same council report also revealed that academies excluded more students than other schools.
Black students in the borough were 1.5 times more likely to be excluded than their white counterparts, according to a separate council investigation.
Council members want the borough to become the first in England to exclude no students in the upcoming school years, according to the Local Democracy Reporting Service (LDRS).
In Southwark, schools, there were no exclusions during the fall 2021 term.
The agreement, which states: “Our aspiration is for 100% inclusion of children in education that keeps them safe and enables them to flourish,” will also be made available to Southwark police.
“When appropriate, we will use a trauma-informed approach to address children’s worrisome behaviour.”
By this, we mean attempting to understand what motivates concerning behaviour rather than accepting it at face value. […]
“We will work toward 100% inclusion approaches to behaviour in educational settings and for best practices across our policies and processes.”
The cabinet member for children, youth, and education, Councillor Jasmine Ali, stated at a meeting on July 18 that “even one child excluded” was too much.
We are beyond thrilled to bring this charter, she continued.
“In 2018, we were properly concerned that 49 pupils were excluded from education in this borough, and they were disproportionately children and young people from black and minority ethnic origins, special education needs or disabilities, and many of them had experience in care.”
It follows a report from April that stated there shouldn’t be any exclusions in primary schools starting in 2026.
In her article, former Children’s Commissioner Anne Longfield also discussed how black students are being “adultified,” or given less attention and security due to their apparent maturity.
The survey asserted that older children are more likely to receive punishment or exclusion.
A month prior to the publication of Longfield’s report, the Metropolitan Police had come under fire for strip-searching ‘Child Q,’ a black 15-year-old girl, without a responsible adult present while investigating a marijuana possession accusation.
“[Adultification] is quite real and it has a big impact on children’s life,” Ms. Longfield asserted.
In essence, youthful people are perceived as being older.
“That means we take a little less care of them, and they don’t get the safeguards and protections they need,” the author says.
Exclusions from primary schools should be prohibited starting in 2026, according to the Commission for Young Lives’ report.
According to Ms. Longfield, the report aims to usher in “a new era of inclusivity” rather than ignore behavioural issues in schools.
According to her comments on the Today programme on BBC Radio 4, “This is not trying to ignore the problems that are clearly being displayed with the child, nor is it about lowering expectations around academic achievement, but it is about taking that responsibility for all children within the classroom.”
“And what we know is that these kids, who frequently have exceptional educational needs, will be able to flourish in school if we intervene early and provide the assistance.”
However, schools frequently find themselves wanting to accomplish that but being stuck in a tight spot.
They don’t frequently have that specialised help available, and some, tragically, claim that exclusion is their only choice.
“For this reason, we hope to usher in a new era of inclusivity that can enable those youngsters to flourish.”
According to the report, Child Q and other black children’s experiences have harmed their confidence in both the police and the educational system.
Additionally, it recommended that teachers receive fundamental training in racial equality, and that the school curriculum be changed to be more inclusive.
According to Jahnine Davis, head of the child-protection organisation Listen Up, “Black children are at a greater risk of encountering this sort of bias due to preconceived assumptions about black children being angry, deviant, and practically having to be shielded from rather than shielded.”
“Black girls frequently inspire distrust.” They are frequently thought of as being hyper-resilient, loud, and confrontational.
“We must examine the history, which is steeped in slavery and colonialism, if you want to understand the adultification of black girls.”
According to disclosures made under freedom of information legislation, 5,279 youngsters were searched in London during the last three years, with 3,939 (or 75%) coming from ethnically varied homes.
16 people who were searched were between the ages of 10 and 12.
Following the significant criticism of the Child Q disclosures, The Met has started to evaluate its policy on strip searches.
According to the Commission on Young Lives study, Ofsted should implement a new inclusion measure that would prevent schools from receiving a “good” or “outstanding” rating unless they are inclusive.
It demanded that schools be “provided with the necessary resources to do this” and that expulsions of students in elementary school be stopped within the following four years.
It was further stated that every school should disclose annually how many students were expelled or transferred from their rolls.
The research observed that some schools have employed strategies including managed movements, off-rolling, exclusions, or pushing families to pursue “home schooling,” and that vulnerable students are occasionally “viewed as a burden that may be dumped onto someone else to deal with.”
One parent who spoke to the panel, whose kid was later diagnosed with autism, claimed that her five-year-old son had been expelled from school 17 times.
He was incredibly small, despite the fact that the school said that there had been defiance and aggression.
There is a “prominent strand of opinion,” according to the report, that denies any connection between being excluded from school and engaging in criminal activity.
However, youth workers, parents, and children described how being excluded from school was a “trigger point” that made students more susceptible to criminal or sexual exploitation or involvement in cross-country drug operations.
There should never be a trade-off between a school’s ability to produce high test results and its capacity to offer a welcoming environment that prioritises the wellbeing of each student.
But frequently it appears that there is,” the paper stated.
It continued, “Or worse, in a minority of schools, they do not feel it is in their interests to even have vulnerable children in their school at all, and they game the system to keep them off their roll.”
Some schools “don’t focus on vulnerable children because they do not feel they have an obligation or responsibility to do so.”
According to the report, the majority of expulsions occur in years 10 and 11, when students take GCSE exams that would affect the school’s standing in league tables.
While the ability to expel was a “essential last resort,” according to Julie McCulloch, policy director of the Association of School and College Leaders, “it is very obvious that we must do everything possible to defuse problems that lead to disruptive behaviour and keep young people in school.”
The “great majority” of schools, she continued, gave this a high priority, but they had to work within “very restricted finances,” which made it difficult for them to serve vulnerable students more fully.
Additionally, she stated that academic achievement is prioritised in school performance tables over how well a school fosters an inclusive environment.
A representative for the Department of Education previously stated: “Suspension and exclusion are required and crucial behaviour control strategies, even though persistent exclusion for young children is rare.
“Through the Attendance Alliance, we are attempting to comprehend and address needless absence, and the Alternative Provision and SAFE taskforces are offering direct, focused support to vulnerable students who are at danger of crime or exploitation in order to keep them engaged in their studies.
In the long run, our recently released SEND and Alternative Provision Green Paper outlined our ambitions to overhaul alternative provision, altering the culture and practise of how settings run and provide the best assistance for their students.