Memorandum submitted by Jeremy Cunningham
I have been working in this field for about
thirty years, as a teacher in the secondary state system, as a
researcher and writer, and for the last eighteen years as a head
teacher. Both schools I headed were non-denominational community
schools. I have considerable experience of curriculum development,
student councils and school democracy, and particularly the relationship
between fairness, due process and good behaviour in school. I
am now working as a consultant with the Open University on a pan-African
education project, aimed at improving the quality of teacher training.
The Crick report and the resulting Citizenship
Orders marked a huge step forward in this field, and the Government
should be proud that at last there is a requirement for young
people to learn about their roles, rights and responsibilities
as citizens. The orders make it clear that this is not just a
matter of ingesting knowledge about systems and procedures, but
the development of democratic attitudes and values, and the practice
of skills—oracy, advocacy, discussion and debate. The Crick
committee built on decades of academic discourse in the field
and the framework bears witness to this.This contrasts with the
situation in 1988 when as a history teacher I was required to
teach the Roman laws of Augustus, as part of the National Curriculum
in History, and there was no requirement to teach about our own
legal system, democracy, human rights, or civil society.
GOVERNMENT DISCOURSE
Citizenship education is naturally affected
by public awareness of the fundamental values of the Government
of the day. There is no doubt that this Government greatly values
education and has invested huge effort and resources in improving
"standards". A major problem is that the purpose of
education is almost never articulated, but is deemed to be obvious
to all. To read and listen to government pronouncements, the need
to compete economically with China and India, comes out much more
strongly than the need to create a socially just, well adjusted
society both with Britain and in the wider world. Tony Blair's
and Gordon Brown's pronouncements about Africa, poverty are signals
that this is an important element of government thinking, as is
the support by DIFID for international school links. However the
economic motive drowns out this strand. Nothing illustrates this
better than the pitiful financial support given to schools to
introduce Citizenship as a new compulsory curriculum element—£3,000.
By contrast, for the introduction of financial and economic awareness,
which is a mere subsection of the subject area, we received £15,000—five
times as much.
The Government needs to be more explicit about
education for a well-ordered, just society, where economic success
goes hand in hand with respect for individuals and groups.
LEADERSHIP
The National College of School Leadership embodies,
in its training programmes and frameworks, the values, skills
and competences expected of school leaders. I have been on two
programmes—the Leadership Programme for Serving Heads, and
the Consultant Leaders Programme. I have also supervised my deputy
head who was undertaking the National Professional Qualification
for Headship. The values elements of these programmes are vague
and almost relativist. The LPSH was based on the HayMcBer business
model, in which values are mentioned as if they are matter of
individual choice for the particular school leader. For Citizenship
to work well in schools, the school leadership cadre need to be
absolutely secure in their commitment to the universal values
embodied in the UN and European Conventions, and the Human Rights
Act. These need to be taught to school leaders, rather like the
10 commandments, as they are the foundation for our partnership
work in the "global village"—from individual to
international community. At present, it is either assumed that
everyone knows these—which is far from the case—or
that somehow one is treading on other people's religious or other
values to be explicit about democracy and human rights.
School leaders need specific training in democracy
and human rights, as the essential values of our national and
global society.
CURRICULUM
After years of debate and complaint about the
crowded curriculum, it was not surprising that the DfES did not
dare to make Citizenship a new subject with its own curriculum
time. It would have meant cutting somewhere else, and there would
have been opposition and disruption. It was quite rational to
allow some years of development in association with PSHE, RE,
and other Humanities subjects. However it is not being done well,
and this does not surprise me. David Bell, the Chief Inspector,
has spoken about this. My school had the advantage of committed
leadership, enthusiastic citizenship co-ordinators, and time available
for suspending the timetable now and again, but my review found
that the teachers who were not specifically trained for Citizenship
did not teach it well, were not motivated to improve, and the
students taught by them had an unsatisfactory experience. Because
of the close link between PSHE and Citizenship, the tutor was
roped in to teaching the Citizenship aspects. Those students lucky
enough to have a motivated tutor interested in this subject had
a good experience; many others had a poor one. I cannot see the
rationale of maintaining Religious Education in its current form.
The PSHE and Citizenship orders and curriculum
advice need to be closely related to the five national outcomes
for children, without giving the schools information overload.
This is still a confused and overlapping area.
CONTINUITY BETWEEN
STAGES
The use of circle time in many primary schools
has been a very positive development—young people as young
as six can play a part in thinking about their values and rules.
Citizenship in the post-16 stage is in a parlous state. Curriculum
2000, the endless round of examinations, AS modules has squeezed
sixth form social and general studies. Many schools have action
groups, such as Amnesty groups, model UN, debates and discussions,
but it is extremely varied and there is no consistency. Key Skills
have slipped a long way down the agenda.
Citizenship should be made statutory for the
primary and post-16 phases. It is illogical for it to be so only
between the ages of 11 and 16. The new emphasis on vocational
education has the danger of bringing a purely instrumental approach
to the last two years of compulsory education.
INITIAL AND
IN -SERVICE
TRAINING
In a sense, all teachers have to be teachers
of citizenship, just as all teachers are teachers of language,
but that does not diminish the need for a cadre of experts, (the
equivalent of the English teachers', passionate experts who are
constantly seeking to improve their practice. This is a difficult
subject to teach well—it crosses disciplines of law, social
sciences, personal health and growth (PSHE)—and it needs
particular classroom managements skills, eg teaching controversial
issues, managing debates, judging between competing rights, such
as freedom of speech or equal treatment. When the 1988 National
Curriculum was introduced, in keeping with Margaret Thatcher's
views, there was no place for social studies, sociology, law or
politics in the pre-16 curriculum. To this day, social sciences
graduates are discouraged from taking up PGCE places as they have
not been studying a "national curriculum" subject. It
is time to change this, and to methodically train up a cadre of
citizenship specialists who can run the subject in schools, and
develop a strong subject association. More places must be made
available in teacher education institutions and social science,
law, economics graduates as well as History, Geography, English
graduates should be encouraged to apply.
My experience of LA support for Citizenship
has been good. There is no doubt that many LA's are very active—I
have read about Hampshire for example. Teacher's TV has run good
programmes. The resources produced by NGOs such as Oxfam, Amnesty,
National Children's Bureau are impressive.
All initial training should include a citizenship
element. The TDA should positively support the development of
a cadre of specialist citizenship teachers drawn largely but not
exclusively from the humanities.
ASSESSMENT
The DfES has given useful guidance in this area.
It was wise not to insist on all schools offering a full or half
GCSE, but many have chosen to do so. The arguments on whether
the subject should be given the status of formal objective assessment,
or allowed the freedom (as has PSHE) of not being formally assessed,
will continue, and it is better for schools themselves to make
the decision. The more schools that wish to offer formal qualifications,
the more the need for proper training, and the more the pressure
will develop in schools for the development of specialist citizenship
teams or departments. For information, one of the strengths of
the Humanities GCSE that we offered at one of my previous schools,
was that we included an assessed section of community service,
in which students were placed in old people's homes, NGOs, etc
for a period of time, like work experience.
There should be encouragement for recognition
of community service, for groupwork and advocacy skills.
CITIZENSHIP AND
SCHOOL ETHOS—"ACTIVE"
ASPECTS OF
CURRICULUM
A key issue here is whether young people are
to be treated as citizens. The Convention on the Rights of the
Child makes young people's participation in decisions affecting
them a requirement. It is a glaring omission that the Government
has not taken the opportunity to ensure that every school governing
body has student representation. There is not even a requirement
for governing bodies to have student observers. Many other countries,
including South Africa, have gone much further in linking up student
councils with governors. It is time for the student voice to be
given more statutory support. I support Ofsted's developments
in listening to young people's views about their schools. The
best way of learning about democracy is by participating in it.
Having experimented with different models of student council work,
I concluded in the end that there had to be a very tight and well
organised link between the form group, the year group and the
whole school council, with proper elections, secret ballot etc,
and that poorly organised democracy was not advertisement for
the process. The law requiring a daily assembly of a "mainly
Christian character" is wrong and unworkable. I ignored it
in favour of assemblies based on more universal values—and
I could not see how people could be required to worship. However
several committed religious staff were able to share their faith
based values with the student body.
This links with behaviour management. There
is debate about whether young people are becoming more challenging
and difficult, with the balance of opinion generally agreeing
that they are less automatically deferential. The Elton report
and most DfES guidance underline the link between overall school
ethos and classroom behaviour. Both parties—adults and young
people are asking for "Respect". Best practice asks
that students play a part in establishing the rules and systems,
both at the micro and at the macro level. However there are very
varied approaches to offences, misdemeanors and sanctions. Terms
such as "No blame bullying" are taken out of context
and misinterpreted. My experience (1991) was that investigating
school offences and crimes, and seeing them through to conclusion,
was best when based explicitly on the norms of justice and human
rights, eg "innocent unless proved guilty", "separation
of investigator from imposer of sanctions" etc. The operation
of such systems is demanding and time-costly, and depends on a
firm values foundation.
School governance regulations should make student
participation in governing bodies a requirement. This should be
linked to democratic procedures in school, through school councils.
Advice on offences and behaviour management in schools should
rest explicitly on the Human Rights Act and the UN and European
conventions.
TEACHERS AND
LEADERS ATTITUDES
I have commented above on the issue of explicit
values. I found that the teachers of my school were generally
positive about the aims of citizenship education. Many incorporated
citizenship elements into their teaching. English, Drama, Geography,
History, Languages and RE teachers were most positive. The Science
teachers were overburdened by the amount of knowledge content
they had to "cover", and had little space or opportunity
to run debates or discussions on science and public life. Most
teachers however regarded it as an "add-on"—something
they would try to bring in if they had the time. As most teachers
taught PSHE, it was easy to see that in their hectic week, the
planning and assessment of their one PSHE lesson, (co-ordinated
by a year team, to share out the load) took last place and was
often the worst taught.
Teachers were nervous of the "rights"
discourse and most keen to ensure that the word "responsibilities"
was always attached. They feared that listening to young people
would give them too much confidence, even arrogance, and would
make it more difficult to keep order in the classroom. In my early
years of headship, I found that measures taken to consult students,
such as questionnaires, focus groups etc were feared and resented
by some staff.
The Government, DfES, QCA etc should continue
to actively promote citizenship education through teachers's TV
and public pronouncements. They should not be defensive about
it, but make it a major feature about why we are educating young
people.
CITIZENSHIP AND
THE WIDER
COMMUNITY
Eighteen years of my career were in designated
"community schools" with protected budgets to run adult
classes in the daytime and evening. This model is now called "extended
schools" and is being funded at the rate of one per authority.
This compares poorly to local authorities that followed the community
education movement in the 1960s, such as Cambridge with its village
colleges, or Leicestershire with its community upper schools.
Blurring the edges between school and the wider community will
generally support a culture of openness and debate. At Sutton
Centre in Nottinghamshire, where I taught History and Humanities,
we had a day centre for the elderly on site and our students were
able to meet them frequently and explore their memories of historical
events. Where a school has enough room for a créche or
a playgroup, adults come into contact with young people and vice
versa and opportunities are opened up for debate and discussion.
These arrangements can develop the desire to campaign and act,
to volunteer and participate. Extending the school day, so that
teachers can work with young people in more informal settings
is very conducive to participation by young people. One way the
Government can encourage this is to allow there to be more Citizenship
specialist schools—so that the process of planning for the
specialism can lead to the development of fruitful community partnerships.
Local authorities such as District Councils have invested in consultative
groups with young people, with the positive result that youngsters
meet their peers from across an area.
The effort to develop community approaches to
education is applauded. New academies need to have governance
systems that are democratic and responsive to the local community,
and not merely to special interest groups, whether they are faith
groups or businesses.
IDENTITY AND
BRITISHNESS
Audrey Osler's research (2005) with young people
in Leicester found that they had a good sense of overlapping identities.
Young people felt both British and South Asian. Human rights codes
provide a very good way of addressing dilemmas surrounding individual
and community issues. For example female genital mutilation is
outlawed by conventions and communities with that particular cultural
tradition cannot defend it under human rights law. The discourse
of human rights allows for examination of situations where rights
and responsibilities conflict—for example we may have the
right to publish material that we will know will offend others,
but we have a responsibility not to stir up hatred. The debate
surrounding the law on religious hatred was illuminated by reference
to our common value system, without securing unanimity. There
should be no apology for our democratic and rights traditions,
that are now supported in theory at least by every nation. Good
quality citizenship education will help young people address these
issues in a positive, participative atmosphere. However there
is also a requirement to reject racism, sexism, ageism etc, and
it is not enough simply to teach young people that there are different
groups, each with their own agenda. We should be teaching young
people explicitly about social justice and inclusion, without
falling into political indoctrination. This is a difficult task,
and refers back to the need for very good quality initial and
in-service training. As pointed out before, it is not enough to
leave this to teachers of other subjects, for whom it is the lowest
priority in their busy schedule.
Discourse on multiculturalism needs to address
issues of social justice and not treat diversity as a problem.
REFERENCES Cunningham,
J (1991) The Human Rights Secondary School in H Starkey (ed) The
Challenge of Human Rights Education. London: Cassell.
Osler, A (2005) Teachers, Human Rights and Diversity.
Trentham.
March 2006
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