House of Commons - Education and Skills

Select Committee on Education and Skills Written Evidence

Memorandum submitted by The Children's Society

1. INTRODUCTION

1.1 As a national voluntary children's organisation, The Children's Society welcomes the opportunity to submit evidence to this inquiry on Citizenship Education. The Children's Society is concerned with the welfare of all children and young people, but especially those who are at risk of social exclusion and discrimination. We have a particular interest in disabled children, looked after children, children in trouble with the law, young refugees, and children and young people at risk on the streets.

1.2 Our organisation works across England and has a well-developed practice base working directly with children and young people in a range of school, community based and specialist projects. Our work with disabled children and young people forms the basis of our submission to this inquiry. The Children's Society is particularly concerned to ensure that the views of disabled children and young people are heard and taken seriously in decisions that affect their lives and in the development of policies, practices and services. This response has been informed by the disabled children and young people that we work with.

1.3 This submission focuses particularly on three aspects of the terms of reference of the inquiry: citizenship education's potential to contribute to community cohesion; the design of citizenship curriculum and the implementation of active aspects of the curriculum.

2. THE POTENTIAL OF CITIZENSHIP EDUCATION TO CONTRIBUTE TO COMMUNITY COHESION AND THE DESIGN OF THE CITIZENSHIP CURRICULUM

2.1 The Children's Society believes that citizenship education has an important part to play in the development of community cohesion and it does this most effectively when it is delivered within the environment of a fully inclusive school. In schools that fully embrace inclusion much attention has been given to raising awareness about disability throughout the whole school community including pupils, teaching staff, governors, lunchtime supervisors, caretakers and parents. This approach is however far from universal. The Children's Society would like to see disability awareness becoming a core component of the citizenship curriculum. We believe this will be of benefit to the whole community and must lead eventually to a shift in the general perception of impairment and disability within society as young people grow up together, learning about one another.

2.2 The Qualification and Curriculum Authority [2003] [18]highlight the importance of PSHE and Citizenship as a curriculum context for exploring attitudes and values, supporting inclusion, challenging discrimination and teaching a respect for diversity. It argues that for this to happen a "whole school approach" is necessary that integrates curriculum provision with school policies and practices. The schemes of work for citizenship at Key Stages 3 and 4, published in 2003, includes guidance on citizenship teaching about diversity. It specifically includes requirements to teach about diversity of national, religious and ethnic identities in the United Kingdom and the need for mutual respect and understanding. There is evidence from the Ofsted report Race Equality in Education[19] that race equality concepts enrich the curriculum as a whole, contribute to effective teaching and learning and support pupil's attainment. Disability equality and awareness is not currently a specific requirement of the citizenship curriculum.

2.3 There has been a range of legislation, policy and guidance relating to children with special educational needs and the Government is committed to embed inclusion in every school and early years settings. The National Curriculum Statement on Inclusion makes it a responsibility of all teachers to plan for diversity. However a lack of training, funding and discriminatory attitudes in many mainstream schools still prevail. The inclusion agenda has had little impact on the proportion of children with special educational needs in mainstream schools or on the range of special educational needs catered for. Ofsted[20] reports that there has been little change in the overall numbers of mainstream pupils educated in mainstream schools in the last four to five years and points to a 10% increase in the number of pupils placed at independent special schools since 2001. They noted that over half the schools they inspected were unaware of the reasonable adjustments duty from Part 4 of the Disability Discrimination Act and that accessibility plans that had been produced were predominantly "paper exercises to fulfil a statutory responsibility".

2.4 A number of UK studies have found that pupils with special educational needs are at higher risk of being bullied or teased [Gray, 2003] 19. Bullying is identified by children and young people that we work with as impacting significantly on their happiness and educational success and as one of the most important issues to tackle in schools. In an ERSC funded study by the University of Edinburgh on the views and experiences of over 300 disabled children, bullying is identified as the main reason why disabled children move from inclusive schooling to special schools. [21]Research has also identified more subtle forms of discrimination. To combat this Meyer [2001] [22]argues there is a need to focus on the development of positive relationships between disabled and non-disabled pupils. The Children's Society's work on bullying in schools across Rotherham has demonstrated that bullying can be reduced as a result of disability awareness raising activities.

2.5 Developments in disability awareness in the curriculum internationally, particularly in the USA have preceded developments in the UK. The National Institute for Urban School Improvement [2001] [23]has integrated disability studies into the general curriculum. They state:

"Not only should we include disabled children in our classrooms, we need to incorporate discussions of the meaning and experience of disabilities into the course of study for all children there is much less information about how to teach about the presence of disability in our society than there is to teach about the presence of disabled students in our classrooms"

2.6 In our experience the teaching of disability awareness promotes positive, respectful and nurturing relationships, familiarity and understanding and reduces fear and rejection. We know that disabled children and young people want above all else to belong and participate in community life. Disabled children and young people emphasised this point in The Children's Society's award winning Ask Us Initiative. [24]

We want to go where other children go

We want to be part of our community not apart from it"

3. IMPLEMENTATION OF "ACTIVE" ASPECTS OF THE CURRICULUM

3.1 The Children's Society particularly welcomes the new duties in the Disability Discrimination Act 2005, which place on schools the requirement to produce disability equality schemes. This has the potential to encourage the promotion of positive attitudes within the school and wider community through ensuring that educational programmes, anti-bullying strategies, and citizenship activities have an explicit focus on disability equality. We believe it is a matter or urgency that schools develop a greater awareness of both the existing and new DDA duties. Schools have the opportunity to use the "active" aspects of the citizenship curriculum to facilitate the involvement of pupils in the development and evaluation of their school's disability equality scheme.

3.2 The importance of taking the views, wishes and feelings of children and young people into account in relation to decisions about their care and education is clearly reflected in a range of legislation, regulation and guidance including the SEN Code of Practice; Removing Barriers to Achievement; The National Service Framework for Children and Young People [Standard 3]; The Children Act 1989 and 2004 and Every Child Matters. Despite this plethora of good intentions the experience of many disabled children and young people is that they are rarely consulted and involved in decisions about their education or the development of services. In our experience many children and young people with communication impairments are not involved in the development of their personal educational plan, not invited to their transition planning meeting and often not consulted about changes of school. The Progress on Safeguards for Children Living Away from Home Report[25] found that in schools children are not systematically consulted on matters which affect them and many authorities are failing to meet their duties particularly in relation to young people with communication impairments or complex needs. Against this backcloth the active aspects of the citizenship curriculum could have an important role to play in ensuring disabled and non disabled pupils can contribute to the development and monitoring of disability equality schemes within their schools.

3.3 School councils have an important role to play in the life of schools and young people's experiences of democratic processes and practices. Where they are effective they can meet some of the active requirements of the National Curriculum for citizenship and at the same time promote inclusive cultures, policies and practices. We know from our experience of developing school councils in both mainstream and special schools, disabled pupils can work alongside their non-disabled peers in influencing change in the school environment and develop a sense of empowerment and ownership from their involvement. However to be fully inclusive, flourish and succeed in achieving their goals school councils must be embedded in whole school policies and practices which foster respect for the views of students and staff.

March 2006