Schools in Wales ‘failing to tackle racism’ – report

ASECONDARY school pupil called a classmate “immigrant” before spitting on the floor in front of him.

The racist incident, caught on the school’s CCTV, is just one in a litany detailed in a new report on racism in schools in Wales.

Others include use of the n-word and the p-word, Muslim pupils being stereotyped as terrorists and extremists, Muslim girls having their hijabs pulled off and racism between various ethnic communities.

The abuse is highlighted in a report published by Race Alliance Wales. It surveyed young people across Wales to look at the effect of racism in the education system in Wales.

Young people told the researchers

that schools are failing to deal effectively with racism and diversity is not reflected in the curriculum or workforce. This affected their attainment, self-esteem, and future career and study choices.

Some reported being unfairly given lower predicted grades and being sent to isolation for having cultural hairstyles not deemed to fit in with school uniform policy.

One boy told how racist insults went unchallenged by staff during a high-school football match.

“During a corner one of my players called one of their black players the n-word,” he told the report’s authors.

“Their whole team ran over to me, as team captain, screaming. But I didn’t really know what to do at that age.

“I kind of just freeze up. I’m probably like 14. When I tell a coach, once again I see nothing’s happened. The player is still in my team like nothing happened, no repercussions. That kind of subconsciously kind of trains me to think if I hear it, what is the point in even reporting it?”

Some of the students reported staff either not knowing how to deal with reports of racism or seeming to be racist themselves.

Examples shared included teachers openly voicing personal negative opinions about Muslim women and wearing the burqa, constantly mispronouncing names, mixing up identities and in some extreme cases even using racial slurs, the report said.

One young person reported: “I had a friend in class who had his name mispronounced and the teacher said, ‘Well I’m not from this p-word land’.

“You know, he used a slur there and we just kind of sat in silence and even though we reported that, he still kept his job, you know?

“We’re still seeing him walking around despite him using a slur like that towards the student.”

Race Alliance Wales said too often schools did not respond effectively when young people reported racist incidents.

“Too often, there was felt to be too great a burden on the victim of the aggression to provide concrete evidence of the incident, with many feeling they wouldn’t be believed or taken seriously, so there was ‘no point’ in reporting,” the organisation said.

“The onus should not be upon these young people to constantly evidence and explain their experiences, but sadly due to a lack of effective processes in educational institutions in Wales, racist experiences are mostly left unresolved.”

In the case of the teenager who spat on the floor in front of a fellow pupil he name-called “refugee”, the incident was dealt with effectively by staff, helped by the CCTV evidence, the report notes.

Other racist instances include primary school children reporting being called “chocolate shark” when swimming with classmates and others being called “curry munchers”.

Young people said racism was often passed off as “banter” or joking and schools did not take it seriously enough.

“In secondary schools, nearly all young people responded that they did not see their race, ethnicity or religion portrayed in the curriculum,” the report adds.

Latest schools data, quoted in the report, show as of 2019 in Wales 11% of primary school learners and 12% of secondary school learners are from black, Asian and minority ethnic backgrounds, but there are variances across Wales ranging from 34.4% in Cardiff schools to 4.1% in Anglesey schools. The proportion of teachers who are black has remained at 0.2% since 2016.

The report’s raft of recommendations includes calling for an official inquiry into racism in schools in Wales, recognising racism as an adverse childhood experience and better training for staff on recognising and addressing racism.

But the document says young people are hopeful: “Despite these serious concerns, young people also expressed a great deal of hope and optimism about changes in representation in the education system in Wales.

“In particular, there was hope due to the Black Lives Matter protests in 2020, the planned changes in the Welsh school curriculum, and the forthcoming Welsh Government Race Equality Action plan.”

Race Alliance Wales launched in 2018 and describes itself as a space where “black, Asian and other ethnically minoritised organisations and individuals can come together and discuss experiences as ethnic minorities in Wales, share information, and develop new ideas and solutions to the growing challenge of racism in Wales.”

Under changes to the new curriculum for Wales, children will be taught about racism and also the contributions and histories of black, Asian and minority ethnic communities.

Professor Charlotte Williams was appointed by the Welsh Government last year to oversee improvements in the teaching of Welsh black, Asian and minority ethnic history.

She told the Western Mail last year that she is “outraged” by ongoing reports of racism in schools including previous reports from Show Racism the Red Card Cymru and schools inspectorate Estyn.

ABOLISH Party’s aims to promote academies and free schools in Wales would effectively see the privatisation of state education.

English academies include large chains of primary schools run for profit, with the result that there is very little provision for children with special needs.

Wales has always been rightly proud of a state education system which aims to provide equal opportunities for children from

working families to compete with their privately-educated peers.

This is no longer the case in England thanks to academies and schools “free” from local authority control as a result of Michael Gove’s education “reforms”.

If we don’t want this to happen here we must prevail against the attempt to abolish devolution. Margaret Phelps

Penarth