Supporting Traveller children

Evidence given to a recent parliamentary inquiry has raised deep concerns about the impact of cuts to specialist education support for children from Gypsy, Roma and Traveller (GRT) communities.

MPs on the Women and Equalities Committee were told by education experts that the school life of children from these communities is blighted by racism and bullying, from both teachers and pupils.

The committee, which is undertaking an inquiry into inequalities faced by Gypsy, Roma and Traveller communities, heard that children feel increasingly marginalised and isolated at school, which is contributing to poor attendance and high exclusion rates (see box).

A key way of countering this is for councils to continue investing in specialist education support services, according to Kalwant Bhopal, professor of education and social justice at the University of Birmingham's centre for research in race and education.

Such services offer advice and training to schools in better supporting this group, as well as provide outreach help to families.

Protect funding

However, she is concerned such a "vital advocacy role for the families" is being eroded by austerity and is calling for the services' funding to be protected.

"We need ringfenced funding for traveller education services because there is evidence that it makes a difference for parents sending their children to school in a safe environment," she told MPs.

"One of the issues that parents talk about is that they don't feel their children are safe. If parents don't feel their children are safe, they won't send them to school."

Brian Foster, executive member of Advisory Council for the Education of Romany and other Travellers (ACERT), said a strength of specialist education support is ensuring that good attainment and attendance at primary school carries on into secondary school.

This is particularly important because bullying, racism and isolation tend to escalate - and grades, behaviour and attendance worsens - as children get older.

Foster said that for two years during his time as a consultant in Hackney, Key Stage 2 results for GRT primary pupils were above the borough-wide average.

Since 2010, Hackney's specialist education support has been cut to just one part-time post, and the proportion of GRT pupils staying regularly at secondary school has worsened.

"It is easy to understand," he said. "When it begins to go pear shaped, there is no one around to sort it out."

However, Conservative MPs on the committee questioned the effectiveness of investing in such specialist support.

Chair Maria Miller raised concerns that prior to such support being cut, attainment levels among this group of children were still poor.

Latest government statistics show that GRT children currently have the worst educational outcomes of any ethnic group, which is the same rate as in 2009/10, a year before austerity measures were introduced.

Little change

Miller said: "I'm sure the traveller education service was very important, but when that service was more readily available, was there significant improvement in the outcomes for young people and the attendance of young people?

"The figures tend to suggest there hasn't been a huge change and wasn't a huge improvement at that point in time."

Philip Davies, Conservative MP for Shipley, believes there should be more onus on parents to improve attendance and attainment, rather than blaming lack of funding for specialist support.

"The list of excuses is endless and all of those examples have one thing in common - none of them are the responsibility of the Gypsy and traveller communities themselves," he says.

Despite these reservations, the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government announced in June that six pilot projects will share £170,000 to improve the education, health and integration of GRT communities. These are being run by or in partnership with communities themselves.

However, it remains to be seen whether this will lead to the kind of tangible positive change that Bhopal and Foster believe specialist education support can offer to this vulnerable group of children.

‘Reform curriculum to better reflect Traveller history'

Gypsy, Roma and Traveller children have the highest rates of both permanent and fixed-period exclusions than any other ethnic group, according to latest government figures (see graphic).

In her evidence to the committee, Professor Bhopal said a factor in this is that the curriculum "does not represent adequately Gypsy and Roma Traveller histories" and makes them feel more marginalised.

If it did, "that would help to break down stereotypes and barriers that continually depict racism", she added.

ACERT chair Rose McCarthy told MPs that the annual GRT History Month should be part of the curriculum to help give children from these communities "an identity in school".

She is also concerned that for Irish Traveller communities, their Catholic faith can put them at odds with the curriculum, in particular around sex education.

"The majority of Irish Traveller communities are Catholic faith families and some of them find it quite difficult that what echoes at home doesn't echo in the schools. The majority of schools they are in are non-Catholic," she says.

"As far as lessons and the curriculum is concerned, for instance on sex education, traveller families are quite against that kind of teaching. Those kind of things are quite taboo."