Ethnicity and Educational Achievement – External Factors

BLACK/AFRICAN-CARIBBEAN STUDENTS:

• Near the bottom of each class group in terms of attainment.

• Working-class females in this group suffer from disadvantages initially but tend to do better than working-class white pupils by the time they take their GCSEs. Fuller suggests this is because they want to appear ‘cool’ in order to present a positive self-image to boys and teachers, but recognise the importance of good qualifications.

• Walness Report:

  • More likely to be permanently excluded and routinely punished more harshly.

  • 1.5 times more likely than White British to be identified as having behaviour-related special needs.

  • Outperformed white pupils in school entry tests (but when changed to teacher observations, pattern was reversed).

  • Likely to live in rented accommodation and to attend schools that are more deprived, as well as live in more deprived neighbourhoods.

INDIAN STUDENTS:

• Do really well within the education system.

• Strong emphasis on self-improvement through education in their culture; many of the children come from professional backgrounds – providing appropriate role models and material advantages.

• Culture is perceived more positively than males from other ethnic minorities.

• Strand focuses on performance in comparison to white pupils – this group do significantly better in the first 4 years of secondary school.

PAKISTANI/BANGLADESHI:

• Some still do relatively badly in school, but recent research suggests these pupils are catching up.

• Since 2000 these students have gained an average of between 22 and 28 percentage points, bringing them in line with national average.

SEWELL – FATHERS, GANGS AND CULTURE:

• Lack of black father figures for black boys to look up to.

• Becomes a ‘burden’ on younger boys.

• Black men shouldn’t be further stigmatised.

FAMILY STRUCTURE AND PARENTAL SUPPORT:

• Moyniham – dysfunctional family structure leads to lack of socialisation. A lone mother may struggle without a breadwinner father for financial support.

• Therefore no male role-model. Meaning children will fail at school and go on to be inadequate parents as well.

• Murray and Scruton see low achievement as a failure to embrace mainstream British culture.

WHITE WORKING-CLASS FAMILIES:

• White working-class pupils often underachieve and have low aspirations.

• McCullock found that ethnic minority pupils are more likely to aspire to go to university.

• Lupton found in predominantly white schools that behaviour was poor and teachers were likely to say this was down to the educational attitude of parents and the lack of support they gave.

• Evans argues street culture is brought into the classroom, in working-class areas this is brutal and students need to withstand intimidation and intimidate others.

EVALUATION:

• One solution is compensatory education, like Operation Head Start in the USA.

• Driver argues cultural deprivation theory ignores the positive effects of ethnicity on achievement.

  • Says the Black-Caribbean family provides girls with strong role models of independent women.

• Lawrence states the real reason for underachievement isn’t low self-esteem, but rather racism.

• Keddie sees cultural deprivation theory as victim-blaming.

  • These children aren’t culturally deprived, they’re culturally different.

  • Underachieve because schools are biased in favour of white culture (ethnocentric).

• Solutions include multicultural education – a curriculum that includes minority cultures, and anti-racist education – policies to challenge prejudice and discrimination.

MATERIAL DEPRIVATION AND CLASS:

• Almost half all ethnic minority children live in low-income households, as against a quarter of white children,

• Ethnic minorities are almost twice as likely to be unemployed.

• Three times as likely to be homeless.

• Almost ½ Bangladeshi and Pakistani workers earned under £7 per hour, compared to ¼ of white British workers.

• More likely to be engaged in shift work – Bangladeshi and Pakistani women more likely to engage in low-paid home-working.

• Reasons for greater risk:

  1. Many live in economically deprived areas with high unemployment and low wage rates.

  2. Cultural factors, such as purdah in some Muslim households – prevents women from working outside the home.

  3. Recently arrived groups, many of whom are refugees, lack language skills and have qualifications not recognised in the UK.

  4. Asylum seekers may not be allowed to work.

  5. May face racial discrimination in the housing and employment market.

• Entitlement to FSM (%):

  • White British – 12.8%

  • Black African – 41.4%

  • African-Caribbean – 26.2%

  • Mixed Heritage – 25.2%

  • Indian – 13.7%

  • Pakistani – 38.2%

  • Bangladeshi – 58.5%

  • Any other group – 29.6%

• Chinese and Indian students from materially deprived backgrounds however do better than most.

• 2011: 86% Chinese girls who received FSM achieved five or more higher grade GCSEs, compared with only 65% of white girls who weren’t receiving FSM.

• This therefore Implies that cultural/ethnic and material factors interact.

RACISM IN WIDER SOCIETY:

• Mason: ‘discrimination is a continuing and persistent feature of the experience of Britain’s citizens of minority ethnic origin’.

• Rex – two ways racism leads to social exclusion:

  • Housing: discrimination means that minorities are more likely to be forced into substandard accommodation than white people of the same class.

  • Employment: Wood et al sent three closely matched job applications to almost 1000 job vacancies with fictitious names from different ethnic groups – one from a white person and two from ethnic minorities. Only 1 in 16 ‘ethnic minority’ applications were offered an interview, compared to 1 in 9 for ‘white’.