So, last week I spent an hour with a Birmingham teacher. I was teaching her about multicultural education, from the first government policy in 1965 onwards, via Coard, Rampton, Swann, to today. I had not prepared anything so it was a case of talking about things in my head, that I had talked or written about over too many years. She lapped it up. She was hungry for every word. She was generous in her response.\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Part of me was pleased to be valued by a younger professional in My Hometown, thinking that long after I am gone she would be educating. The other part of me was angry (righteous anger) that, after she had been through teacher training and now had taught in schools for a few years she did not know the basics of multicultural education. Is race equality\/education the only area where we do not build on the previous foundations and leave the subsequent generations ignorant through our colourblind policies. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
I recall a very senior educationalist (director of education of a multiacademy trust) asking me to explain to her what I meant by \u2018under representation\u2019 when I had asked whether their teachers reflected the ethnic minorities in their school. And the forever increasing number of schools who do not even have a working policy on race let alone an action plan.
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So, last week I spent an hour with a Birmingham teacher. I was teaching her about multicultural education, from the first government policy in 1965 onwards, via Coard, Rampton, Swann, to today. I had not prepared anything so it was a case of talking about things in my head, that I had talked or written … <\/p>\n