1/ ‘We’ve got to stick with what we’ve got’ - a historical view. The status quo position around education is interminably - ‘it can’t change’. Disclaimer. It ALWAYS does. Humans evolve. Education evolves. Let’s start at the beginning. This ain’t the end of history. 2/ Dawn of recorded history - Ancient Sumeria (1800 BC). YP schooled in ancient epics, royal praise poetry, learning to write in cuneiform or Akkadian, learning arithmetic. The ruling classes would’ve considered schooling for the ‘peasantry’ ludicrous.

1/ Zero tolerance (ZT) beh policies proceed from scientifically illiterate premises. First, 'consistency' is conflated with 'inflexibility'. Consistency is about creating a safe, predictable environment underpinned by shared values, NOT enforcing rigidly defined rules. 2/ Responding in the same way every time regardless of context is not consistency, it’s dogmatism. Outcome- YP excluded from defining the aims/values of their education & subject to beh ‘policing’ to ensure compliance with aims applied TO them.

1/ Over the past few yrs, working as an Ed Psych in a secure unit (prison), mental health unit & PRU has been both rewarding, challenging and disturbing. A major theme (more prevalent now than I've experienced in all my time w/g in ed) is the way the sch syst traumatises many YP. 2/ There’re no easy answers or targets for blame. This post is not an attack on teachers or schs, it’s an account of what I’m constantly as a practitioner. I used to be a teacher, work closely with teachers week in week out and have huge respect for the work they (and we) do.

1/THREAD This yr I researched the impact of racism on YP in Eng. Some findings. Not easy reading. Thx to YP with lived exp involved with @NExclusions, @TakeBackTPower, @StopWatchUK & others for helping me understand #racism #criminaljustice #education #edutwitter #school #housing 2/ EDUCATION - the over-exclusion of Black students is present at all ages. There's a persistent problem of stereotyping & unconscious bias, a “cumulative process of mounting disciplinary sanctions for relatively low-level disruption that might go unpunished for others”

1/ Some disturbing statistics in regard to Child Poverty, income & free sch meals (FSM). Relative child poverty has increased significantly under this gov. Institute for Fiscal Studies (IFS). It increased from 3.6 million (2011/12) to 4.2 million (2018/19). Projected to rise 2/ 2019 report, the IFS asserted that working age benefit cuts have further increased income inequality. They wrote:
"The bottom fifth of the income distribution on average saw its income decline by 1.6%... conversely, the top fifth saw it grow by 0.8%".