Head Teacher Sends Children to Isleworth to meet 'other'

[bendywillow]

Interesting article in the Daily Fail (sorry DM readers) about a head teacher in Devon who has decided to develop children's understanding of multiculturalism by setting up an exchange with a school in London. The responses of the parents are quite interesting. I would be inclined to side with the parents who find it all a bit patronising - my boy goes to a similarly monocultural school (but in Somerset, not Devon) but he, like most of his friends, have regular trips to cities and urban areas, and our family is culturally diverse, as is our group of friends. It just seems that this is an OTT response to a minor and now out of date point brought up by OFSTED - like the head teacher is the guiding light, helping all those poor little country bumpkins understand what brown people look like (sorry, that was a bit unfair, but you get the gist?) Wouldn't it just be nice for students to meet other students, rather than this being a box ticking exercise to address OFSTED concerns?

Was wondering what other MN'ers though of this?

The link, here:

www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2651108/Rural-school-deemed-white-Ofsted-visits-London-mix-ethnic-pupils.html

[Feenie]

Lots and lots of schools do this - my ds's included. Yes, it's probably ticking a box, but ds enjoys it and it's fun. Can't see the problem with meeting different children at all.

[edamsavestheday]

I take your point but I think it's probably worth doing - not just on the multicultural issue but there will be so many differences between a school in Devon and one in London, it'll expand the children's horizons.

[BarbarianMum]

I think it's quite a good idea.

Am a bit that you think that casual visits to urban areas is a good way of getting to know people from other cultures - how does that work?

This sort of exchange might also help dispel the myth commonly held by many of Britain's minority communities that the countryside is a no go area.

[bendywillow]

BarbarianMum - I don't think that casual visits to urban areas is a good way of getting to know people from other cultures - part of the reason why I think that this visit is a bit .

[Fideliney]

I think it's a pragmatic anticipation of the next Ofsted inspection (which is now due) rather than anything else. Didn't I read that the head had been rather upfront about the fact that there were certain things they needed to do to jump from 'good' to 'outstanding' and that this was one of them?

If you disagree that such trips should happen, blame the inspection regime rather than the head.

I also seem to remember reading this week that some of the children in the 'trojan horse' scandal schools thought that the UK was a muslim-majority country. If that is the case, arguably some inner-city pupils are suffering equally or more from mono-cultural environments and drawing some strange conclusions. Maybe school twinning across a range of demographic divides should become standard?

[bendywillow]

Also, can't say that our culturally diverse group of friends and family see Devon or Somerset as no-go areas, but can appreciate that other people may feel that way, if they've not been to visit before. These days, certainly compared to 10 years ago, most of our major towns and cities in the West Country feel much more diverse.

Also, to access many extra-curricular activities, kids who live in particularly-rural and somewhat monocultural areas travel to larger towns and cities to participate, and so as a result, mix with a far more ethnically diverse group of kids than they might do at school, and friendships and understanding develops in the same way as it might at school. I was just thinking that the trip to London seemed like quite an unusual way to tick an Ofsted box, especially given that the wider experiences of children are, in all likelihood, far more diverse than the headteacher and reverend in this article are suggesting.

[Fideliney]

To travel all the way to West London from Honiton, ignoring some much closer distinctly ethnically ethnically diverse areas does seem odd I grant you.

[bendywillow]

I don't disagree with these trips at all, and agree with you, particularly in light of the Trojan Horse school issues in Birmingham, that rural/urban exchanges are valuable for students, in the same way that exchanges to the continent are valuable for language students. I have also read reports where some urban children do not understand how the food chain works, and some have never been to the seaside or participated in tree climbing, fort building, and other outdoor activities.

What I was interested in was the assumption that this is being linked to, even seen as a response to, a flawed assessment of the children's ability to have seen, understood and appreciated difference in terms of environment and multiculturalism.

[bendywillow]

Fideliney - I had thought that, too, but in the local media they made it clearer that the head teacher had links through previous jobs to the exchange school, so not as strange as it might first sound, although she must also have links with closer schools - in Exeter, for example, where friendship groups that develop are more likely to be sustainable? Then it wouldn't cost parents £35 to be involved in this kind of activity?

[Fideliney]

There are so many layers of politics and whatnot at work, it's almost impossible to unpick though, don't you think?

If there is suddenly some kind of crackdown to make sure no child is living in a narrow monoculture, it is absolutely fine by me, even if it does result in some daft and unnecessary trips/programmes/lessons for my child. Rather that than the opposite.

[Fideliney]

Ah thanks - that explains it.

Honiton to Exeter wouldn't be much of a trip. Maybe a cross country run?

[howrudeforme]

Oh - my kid doesnt have this but we're in London. In that case I'd like him to get down to rural parts of UK to experience some 'monoculturalism' too. It would do him some good, I think.

World doesn't revolve around big cities imho. Big cities are pretty monoculture too these days.

[humpitydumpity]

Hmmmmm ok

[Pixel]

in the local media they made it clearer that the head teacher had links through previous jobs to the exchange school

It doesn't sound as if this is an 'exchange' though does it, only a one-way thing. It might seem more of a genuine exercise in getting to know one another if some 'inner-city' kids visited the 'country' kids in return and saw how they live. Would they not benefit from seeing a different 'culture' too?