With a grotesque average of 31 pupils being permanently excluded every day in the UK alone, some of which being in primary (elementary) school, it is clear that there’s a problem with the current way behavior is dealt with in the education system.
No child deserves to be permanently excluded from school. Whilst I do understand that people may argue with this, explaining that the presence of disruptive students may hinder the learning progress of other students, a society that deals with trouble by simply trying to erase it and not fix it, is a segregated society. Choosing which child is ‘fit’ to remain in school and ‘excel at life'(by their definition) and choosing which child is not, generates a gross elitism and is one of the ways the education system seems to funnel out anyone they deem unworthy of being part of this elite. According to the department of education, the majority of permanent exclusions(29%) occur, not because of violent offenses, but because of “persistent disruptive behavior”, something that could be dealt with in a way that doesn’t exclude these students from their peers and treats them like they’re the worst-of-the-worst.
One of the worst things about this is when you look at the statistics. Statistics released by the department of education on who gets excluded makes it clear that there’s an overwhelming difference in students’ financial background, with students who are eligible for free school meals being excluded a higher percent of the time. This bias and the fact that class can impact how you are treated within the education system is further proof to support the fact that our society is structured in such a way to mainly benefit the rich. Not only this, but it comes as no shock that males are the main victims of exclusions, outnumbering girls 4 to 1 and engraining into the minds of young boys that they’re the aggressive, troubled ones. The conclusion that Ofsted came up with that African-Caribbean students were excluded six times more than white students, I think is a true reflection of the perception of black boys in the education system as ‘aggressive’ and ‘threatening'(although this data was collected from 1994, research has consistently shown that there’s disproportionality when comparing these ethnicities and their rates of exclusions.)
As I briefly mentioned earlier, being permanently excluded can cause serious damage to a child’s future prospects. After reviewing 263 records of students who were permanently excluded, it was found that 117 of these students, who had no recorded offenses prior to their exclusion, had recorded offences following their exclusion. 13 of which began their criminal activities in the same month that they were permanently excluded. Telling a child that they’re a ‘bad kid’ but not helping them to improve in the way that schools should, only hinders their progress and in fact causes them to ‘act out’ more, especially since the majority have behavioral problems and/or have been previously in or around abusive situations, thus being in dire need of help anyway. Of the 19 interviewees interviewed by The RDS on their exclusions, who were now available for work, 12 were unemployed and, although his is a small sample size, I believe it provides some insight on the negative long-term effects of exclusion.
Discarding students is no way to deal with issues and only causes more issues for the child.
Although the government instructs local councils to ensure that every child is in full-time education, after some research, it is evident that their efforts seem quite poor. Cramming students who they consider ‘unruly’ into pupil referral units and other education units for students with behavioral problems, could be seen as inhumane in the way that it creates a slight “us” and “them” mentality and causes students attending to feel like outcasts. The fact that something they did when they were so young could determine where they end up in the future and limit them so much is disgraceful.
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