In peace,
Women for Women International

There are cases where ‘inclusion’ may well work really well for all concerned, but it is not at all uncommon for classes to be hugely disrupted by a child, or children, whose needs are not being met properly or at all.

Many of us are therefore inadvertently complicit in having to cope with scenarios which are not really acceptable for the child, the staff and for the other children.

It is not possible to make sweeping generalisations – but, in effect, this all goes back to what I have maintained on an earlier blog – that we have no effective procedures for ‘upwards evaluation’ of those in authority over us.

As a teaching profession, we are ‘done to’ and there is no, true, two-way process of having our voices properly heard and regarded.

You and I know that there are untold scenarios of unhappy classrooms where adults and children alike barely cope with their day to day circumstances.

It is difficult enough having classes of 30 very young children – add children with some particular difficulties into the mix and the situation can be intolerable.

I haven’t done the maths yet – but I wonder what we could raise from just one country if all the staff and parents of all the schools focused their efforts on raising money for ‘water’ during one of the annual holiday periods?

Ryan’s Well
http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-6501743967622295811

(it’s only the first 10 minutes of a 50-minute documentary, but very moving)

Magazine story:
http://www.readersdigest.ca/magazine/ryans-well

Ryan’s Well Foundation:
http://www.ryanswell.ca/

It seems to me, then, that the approach in Ontario is decades ahead of, arguably, where we should be in the UK!

Sadly, it looks like we In England are not steadily maturing in this issue as further religious-based schools continue to be funded by the state.

There has been a great deal of political rhetoric about parents ‘choosing’ schools for their children in this country – but there is hardly a ‘choice’ scenario in many areas of the country if there is, in reality, only a Christian-controlled or aided school in many of our villages! Where is the ‘alternate’ local school to enable a choice?

Sometimes one can perceive a prejudice that Church schools are somehow offering a superior ethos and education to ‘community’ schools – and I suggest that surely this is an insiduous attitude.

In some ways the situation has improved over the years – in that our young pupils do now learn that there are different cultures and religions around the world and in our country. When I was attending school as a child, I was led to believe that there was ONLY Christianity and my contemporaries and I were not taught about any other religions.

There is a big difference, however, between being educated about cultures and religions around the world and being made to worship in a specific religion as part of the daily school routine. I would like to see English schools practice greater equality and leave religious practices and worship to choices in the home.

It began to change in the 1980’s, when courts ruled that schools could not impose solely Christian religious exercises; for the next decade or so we had a mix of readings from different religious traditions as part of our opening exercises. Somewhere along the line both the Lord’s Prayer and God Save the Queen were dropped.

Gradually, but surely, many of our schools (and our largest school districts) became mostly non-Caucasian and non-Christian. Toronto schools are expected to be majority Muslim in enrolment within the next decade, but Sikhs, Hindus, Buddhists, and a variety of Asian faiths as well as Jews and Christians are represented. We now have a low-key emphasis on recognizing these faith traditions and incorporating some learning about them into the core curriculum. The “character education” component (pooh-poohed by some, but not me) includes teaching about common values: responsibility, integrity, compassion, and so on. This is embedded in the regular curriculum, not taught separately, at least in my experience.

While there are many choices parents have to attend alternative schools, or to initiate them – for instance, schools focusing on arts, technology, self-directed learning, or whatever – schools based on religion are not allowed (the notable exception being Catholic schools, which are still publicly funded due to regulations in the British North America Act of 1867). A fierce debate was held in the provincial election a few years ago about extending funding of religious schools to other faiths, but this is overwhelmingly disapproved by the general population.

I think the effort to build not tolerance but a welcoming attitude and understanding of people of different faiths and backgrounds has been largely a success in our schools here – I’ve seen huge improvement over the last 15 years. Racial or religious taunting, bullying or discrimination among the children is very rare. On the other hand, common values are taught and the children themselves often design presentations, plays or skits to show how the value is related to their own culture or faith tradition.

This is one way, perhaps, of encouraging the schools to be places of education (including education about various cultures and faiths) but not worship.

This article, if taken at face value, is a case in point about the lack of proper mechanisms to hold people to account in authority over us.

It would seem that there is a need for an effective procedure to hold Ofsted to account for the circumstances as described in this article.

A ‘complaint’ was dismissed out of hand by the organisation that the complaint was about.

I am totally sympathetic with the frustration, and unfairness, which many people suffer at the hands of bureaucracy when it is at the expense of ‘humanity’ – or sheer common sense!

Debbie