Before the discussion of whether schools are racist towards ethnic minorities, the relevance of other factors that could lead to an explanation of ethnic differences in educational attainment must be explained. One such factor is language. A majority of Asian households only see English as a substitute language due to fact that many Asian parents were not brought up speaking English nor were they brought up in England. In some West Indian households ‘creole’ or ‘patois’ (variation upon conventional English) are spoken. However, recent research evidence does not support the view that language is an important factor. A study by Geoffrey Driver and Roger Ballard found that by the age 16, Asian children whose native tongue was not English did poorly in English speaking schools. The Swann report found that linguistic factors might hold back the progress of a few West Indian children.
A number of writers suggest that the nature of family life affects level of attainment among ethnic minorities. If this view is taken then West Indians are held to have a family life which fails to encourage children to do well in education and in which there is an adequate provision of toys, books and stimulation from West Indian parents. It has also been suggested that the West Indian population in Britain has a high proportion of one parent families and a large number of working women who leave their children without close parental supervision in the early years of their lives. In contrast to West Indian families, Asian families are widely believed to be more close knit and supportive of their children’s education. In a summary of the report done by Swann, suggested that Asian family structure were more tightly knit than either the white or West Indian family, and that this contributes to responsibility for the higher level of achievement posed by many Asian children. Geoffrey Driver and Roger Ballard claim that the majority of the original South Asian immigrants to Britain come from rural areas had little formal education. However, research shows that a majority of these parents soon develop a high aspiration for their children therefore not only would they encourage them to work hard at school, but they would also be prepared to give guidance support to their children in order for them to get further study qualifications.
One cannot fully rely on the Swann report, due to insufficient evidence to reach a firm conclusion. Many researchers agree that the majority of West Indian families are concerned about their children’s education. The majority of West Indian parents have great academic aspirations for their children. Even though this is a goop point major research in Britain has shown the Asians were more interested in their child’s education than West Indians. Although class certainly accounts for some of the inequality in education between ethnic groups, it may not account for all. The Swann report and many commentaries or researchers have suggested that racism within schools may also be an important cause of ethnic minority pupils doing poorly in school.
The Swann report clearly stressed the importance to the role of the educational system in explaining underachievement amongst different ethnic minorities. In my point of view one can never say that every single teacher is racist towards ethnic minorities, obviously it could be accepted that only a small minority of teachers were consciously racist, but this can be seen as a result of unintentional racism. Teachers, and the books and other materials they use, sometimes support the negative image of ethnic minorities. Bernard Coard (Researcher) led the largest attack on the British Educational System to the treatment of ethnic minorities. He claimed that the British system actually makes black children become educationally subnormal by making them feel inferior in every way. Here are some factors in which Bernard Coard shows the negatives of the British educational system : - (I) West Indian children are told that their way of speaking is second rate and unacceptable, the implication being that they themselves are second rate as human beings, (II) The word ‘white’ is associated with good; the word ‘black’ with evil. Coard gives an example of a children’s book which the ‘white unicorn’ and the ‘white boys’ are able to repel an attack by the violent and evil ‘black pirates’, (III) The content of the education that children receive tends to ignore black people. Reading books often contain only white people, and when blacks do feature they are normally shown in subservient social roles such as servants. Coard claims that the people whose lives are studied and acclaimed are white. Black culture, music and art are all conspicuous by their absence from the curriculum, (IV) The attitudes to race conveyed in the classroom are reinforced by the pupils outside it. In playground arguments white children may retaliate by describing West Indians as ‘black bastards’.
Research has shown that teachers expect black children to fail and this produces a self fulfilling prophecy in which they live up to the expectation they have been labeled with. Not only are black children played in lower sets, they themselves believe that they are certain to fail. Research shows that a majority of West Indian children are portrayed by their teachers as underachievers with disciplinary problems.
