{"id":1769,"date":"2023-12-28T14:17:18","date_gmt":"2023-12-28T14:17:18","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.forwardpartnership.org.uk\/?p=1769"},"modified":"2024-09-30T18:26:40","modified_gmt":"2024-09-30T18:26:40","slug":"the-multicultural-education-context-in-birmingham-that-tim-inherited-and-enhanced","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.forwardpartnership.org.uk\/?p=1769","title":{"rendered":"Tribute to Tim Brighouse – for his contribution to antiracist multicultural education in Birmingham"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Tim (as everyone called him; it would have been inappropriate to call him Mr Brighouse) left Birmingham around the time I joined the Council as a Schools Advisor. So, what little I know of him I learnt afterwards, including now<\/a>. During my PhD research I learnt about his extensive work on race and education and which is included in my 2019 book – British Pakistani boys, education and the role of religion- in the land of the Trojan Horse\u2019.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

It is necessary to provide a bit of background to what Tim inherited in Birmingham education in terms of multicultural education. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

The city\u2019s education department was one of the early responders to\nneeds of immigrant children as recorded in Rose et al: Colour\nand Citizenship (1969). The authority was also the first to acknowledge\nthe plural nature of society by issuing guidance on the teaching of world\nreligions (Does it do as it says? Learning for living. 15:4 125-126). Later, by the\n1980s, in place was the Multicultural Support Service which was where my\nteaching career had begun in 1983. Building on this, the incoming\nLabour administration, in the 1984, had made clear its commitment to a\nmulticultural and anti-racist education:<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Curriculum must reflect the diversity of cultures in our society\nand must positively counter racism <\/em><\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Multi-cultural curriculum must apply to all subjects, all age\ngroups and all schools and colleges<\/em><\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

In-service training for teachers with particular emphasis on\ntraining in racism awareness<\/em><\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Greater recruitment of ethnic minority teachers.<\/em><\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

The Multicultural Support Service contained\nwithin it a number of units. One of these was the Multicultural Development\nUnit which had 34 experienced teachers who were strategically placed in primary\nand secondary schools. Apart from teaching, their job was to assist in the\nwhole process of moving towards an education that better meets the needs of all\npupils in a multicultural city. Another was the Afro-Caribbean Teaching Unit,\nmade up of 7 experienced teachers. There were also the Community Languages Unit\nand an English as a second language unit which I had joined upon training as a\nteacher. The above service produced the Multicultural Review. Each issue\ncarried articles including some written by practising Birmingham teachers.\nEdited by David Ruddell, the journal was circulated to all schools, free of\ncharge. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

At the time, Birmingham City Council had in place a 20% target for\nrecruitment of ethnic minority employees. In 1993, the year Tim arrived, the\nEducation Department had reported achieving well in excess of the target, at\n33%; 29% in 1992. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

There is a story about Tim\u2019s arrival in\nBirmingham and his absence from his office for a week or more. He was out and\nabout visiting schools across the local authority. This personal approach was\nto mark his ten years in the city; he was clearly not an office-based  bureaucrat. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

He says thank you<\/a>, when it’s merited, whether he sees something worthwhile himself or it is reported to him by his advisers. He has sent out 5,000, maybe even as many as 10,000 thank you notes in the last nine years. He won’t have talk about his leadership being all inspiration. “It’s 1% inspiration and 99% hard work and attention to detail and trying to get systems right,” he says.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Sir Tim Brighouse was an extraordinary man <\/a>who embraced so many paradoxes, perhaps that is why he was so extraordinary. He was understated and humble, yet had significant influence at the top levels as well as local ones. He was all about school improvement at a system level and yet always remained the champion of teachers and students, never losing his connection with, or love of, the classroom. He was incredibly intelligent and insightful and yet never used that over people nor ever used it to make others feel inferior, he had a way of elevating others<\/em>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

He advocated for a similar approach in others.\nIn his book ‘How Successful Headteachers Survive and Thrive’ Tim suggested that\nHeads should greet children and teachers as they enter school. They should go\non a daily walk, talking to kitchen staff and cleaners as well as teachers, and\nsometimes follow a pupil through a day’s lessons. They should say\n“we”, not “I”. And they should spend two hours a week\ndoing \u201cacts of unexpected kindness\u201drememberingbirthdays and writing appreciative notes.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In another of his books \u2018Essential pieces \u2013 the jigsaw of a successful school\u2019, Tim advocated leading and managing at different levels, ensuring that everyone plays their part. In addition, he made a case for creating a fit environment \u2013 visually, aurally, behaviourally and in a way that encourages learning \u2013 and involving and connecting with parents and the community.  <\/p>\n\n\n\n

During his nine-year tenure, the authority was at the forefront of developments in antiracist multicultural education. In 2003, Warren and Gillborn, who had been commissioned by Birmingham City Council and Birmingham Race Action Partnership, in their report Race Equality and Education in Birmingham<\/a> <\/em>stated how well the city was doing and reminded us that others often followed its example:  <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Birmingham Local Authority has\nestablished an enviable reputation as an urban authority that takes seriously\nboth an overall agenda to \u2018raise standards\u2019 and a commitment to greater equity\nand social inclusion. <\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Birmingham has been identified\nnationally as a leading authority in the field of race equality: consequently\nour findings have significance beyond the city itself. <\/em> <\/p>\n\n\n\n

The Local Authority was well known for the publication of resources on race and education. One such document was Together we can stop bullying \u2013 guidance for schools and other education services on challenging bullying and racial harassment<\/em>. I particularly recall that document because I was asked to help revise the Section 5: Guidelines for reporting, recording and monitoring racial incidents, in the light of the Macpherson Report. Another resource was We also Served \u2013 testimonies of the contribution made in two World Wars by the peoples of the Indian Sub-Continent, Africa and the Caribbean. <\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Later, in an interview with Gillborn et al<\/a>, Tim recalled his work as Chief Education Officer in Birmingham, emphasising that by the early 1990s the local authority had access to detailed data on performance by ethnicity and gender:  <\/p>\n\n\n\n

The period where I went to Birmingham – so that’s ’93 – by that\ntime, in Birmingham \u2026we had rich data about how well different groups were\nperforming. Now nationally we hadn’t and I distinctly remember when I was in\nBirmingham saying, \u2018Hey, come on, I’ve got a problem with African Caribbean\nboys’ – and girls – but particularly boys and particularly poor boys\n\u2026Incidentally when I [went] to a school and ask[ed], \u2018How are African-Caribbean\nboys doing in your school’ – and I knew the answer – the leadership of the\nschool were surprised that I was asking the question and [they] clearly hadn’t\nthought about it. \u2026So I think that the driver to get interested in all the\nissues from about that period on was because by the time I left Birmingham,\nthen all that data was available. <\/em><\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Tim explained to the researchers that the data\nhad given the local authority the leverage to open up questions about racial\ninequality that many individual schools had not yet begun to acknowledge. This\nprovided the basis for the establishment of groups; one for African Caribbean\nachievement and another one for Pakistani and Bangladeshi pupils. The groups were\nresponsible for monitoring the experience and attainment of the target group of\npupils and for recommending improvements and initiatives designed to raise\nachievement. These groups were radical in many ways, especially so because they\nprovided a platform for Black and Asian community activists to bring their\nideas to headteachers and local authority policymakers as well as holding the\nbureaucrats to account.  <\/p>\n\n\n\n

There were numerous initiatives that resulted\nfrom this approach and these achievement groups, including work with Black and\nAsian parents, mentoring schemes targeted at ethnic minority students who were\nunderachieving and regular reports being published which provided the city much\nuseful data. Above all else, in a city where the phrase \u2018dictatorship of the\nbureaucrats\u2019 had been coined (Newton in his book Second City Politics) it was during\nTim\u2019s time that such culture of accountability in education became a norm,\nincluding and especially for ethnic minorities who were previously kept at a\ndistance from education centres of power and decision-making.  <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Probably the best document that summarises the\nrace equality work in Birmingham Education during that period was the\nsubmission to the Stephen Lawrence Inquiry Public Policy Review Panel\nBirmingham: <\/p>\n\n\n\n