Barri er sallianceforlearning.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2020/07/barriers-report... · 4.6 Increasing...

BarriersVisible and Invisible Barriers:

the impact of racism on BME teachersThe Runnymede Trust

Dr Zubaida Haque and Sian Elliott

An NUT commissioned report

Throughout thisreport, reference ismade to annexes.

These can be found atwww.teachers.org.uk/

equality/equality-matters

Barriers

ContentsExecutive Summary ................................................................................................................4

Key findings ..........................................................................................................................5

Structure of the report ...........................................................................................................6

Chapter 1.0: Introduction .......................................................................................................71.1 The current study ........................................................................................................8

1.2 Methodology ...............................................................................................................8

1.3 Data analysis...............................................................................................................9

Chapter 2.0: Literature Review ............................................................................................11

2.1 Motivations for entering the profession........................................................................12

2.2 Teacher training.........................................................................................................12

2.3 Issues affecting retention ...........................................................................................13

2.4 The distribution of BME teachers in primary and secondary schools ..............................13

2.5 BME teachers’ career progression ..............................................................................14

2.6 BME teachers and gender ..........................................................................................15

2.7 The curriculum and inclusivity .....................................................................................15

2.8 Conclusion of the literature review ..............................................................................15

Chapter 3.0: BME Teachers’ Survey ....................................................................................173.1 Questionnaire rationale...............................................................................................18

3.2 Characteristics of respondents ...................................................................................18

3.3 Diversity of schools and staff......................................................................................20

3.4 Teaching characteristics.............................................................................................20

3.5 Socio-demographic and employment characteristics of participants by ethnicity.............21

3.6 The experiences of BME teachers in primary and secondary schools.............................23

3.7 Attitudes of males and females in the teaching profession ............................................25

3.8 Attitudes of younger teachers.....................................................................................25

3.9 Attitudes of BME teachers in diverse schools...............................................................25

3.10 The link between demographic characteristics and career progression among BMEteachers ...................................................................................................................26

3.11 Conclusions from the survey data ...............................................................................29

Chapter 4.0: The Qualitative Study ......................................................................................314.1 Day to day life as BME teachers in schools..................................................................32

4.2 Impact of racism on teachers .....................................................................................34

4.3 The impact of the ‘Prevent’ agenda on teachers ...........................................................35

4.4 Career progression – visible and invisible barriers ........................................................36

4.5 The impact of performance related pay on BME teacher career progression ..................38

4.6 Increasing the recruitment of BME teachers.................................................................39

Chapter 5.0: Conclusions .....................................................................................................41

Chapter 6.0: References ......................................................................................................45

Photos by Rehan Jamil

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01

Executive SummaryKey findings

Structure of the report

Barriers

Executive SummaryThis report presents the findings of a survey andqualitative study of the experiences of Black,Asian and ethnic minority (BME) teachers inEngland. Commissioned by the National Union ofTeachers (the NUT), the Runnymede Trustworked closely with the NUT to design,administer and evaluate the findings. The Centreof Dynamics and Ethnicity at ManchesterUniversity (Nan Zhang) also contributed to thepreliminary analysis of the survey findings. Thefindings are predominantly based on the resultsfrom questionnaires and interviews with teachersbut also draw on findings from previous studiesevaluating the experiences of Black, Asian andethnic minority teachers in the UK.

Overview of the researchPrevious research (e.g. Cunningham andHargreaves, 2007; Basit and Roberts, 2006;McNamara et al, 2009)1 has highlighted thesignificant barriers for Black and ethnic minority(BME) teachers in schools and in relation tocareer progression. This research wascommissioned by the NUT to explore theexperiences and barriers for BME teacherswithin schools and to identify any factors relatingto poor career progression for BME teachers.

This report brings together evidence and datafrom a range of sources, including:

• research literature on BME teachers’experiences within schools

• a survey of around 1027 BME teachers

• focus group interviews with 15 BME teachersfrom different geographical locations andstages of schooling.

The research project began in January 2016,fieldwork began in April and ended in July 2016,and the research project was completed inSeptember 2016.

The questionnaire was designed by the NUT(after consultation with the Runnymede Trust)and placed live on the Survey Monkey websitefor seven weeks between 28 April 2016 and 17June 2016. The survey link was sent to allregistered BME teachers through NUT regionaloffices and Black members networks. A total of1,027 BME teachers responded to the surveyby the closing date, 17 June 2016.

The questionnaire was targeted at ‘Blackteachers’ (NUT’s term for all BME teachers)which skewed the results in two ways:

• while other minority ethnic teacherscompleted the questionnaire, the largestethnic group of teachers was Black

• there was no counterfactual (i.e. whiteteachers) to compare the results with.

This limited the analysis in terms of comparingthe career positions and experiences of BMEteachers with their white peers, but also meansthat differences amongst BME respondents inthis survey appear relatively small (because ofthe size of each group).

Overall, the BME teachers’ survey andinterviews revealed that there are largedifferences in perceptions and careerprogression among BME teachers, and that,more importantly, discrimination based onrace is one of the more significant and deep-rooted factors that affect the experience ofteaching and career progression for BMEteachers. Differences in experiences inschool and career progression areparticularly marked for Black Caribbean andBlack African teachers in comparison toother minority ethnic groups. Age, length ofexperience in teaching and geographicallocation were also important factorsinfluencing the experience of BME teachersin primary and secondary schools.

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1 Cunningham, C. and Hargreaves, L. (2007) Minority Ethnic Teachers’ Professional Experiences: Evidence from the TeacherStatus Project. DfE Research Report, RR853. McNamara, O., Howson, J. Gunter, H. and Fryers, A. (2009) Supporting theLeadership Aspirations and Careers of Black and Minority Ethnic Teachers, Birmingham, NASUWT

EXECUTIVE SUMMARY

Key findingsWhat did the findings from the survey and focusgroups tell us?

Who are the respondents?• Overall 1,027 respondents completed the

questionnaire. The majority of the teachingsample worked at secondary school level(51%). 35% worked in primary schools andthe remaining respondents worked innursery, post-16 further education collegesand pupil referral units.

• Two thirds of the sample were classteachers, 11% head of year and 11respondents at head teacher level. Blackrespondents were more likely to be in seniorroles compared to their Asian counterparts.However, Asian respondents were onaverage younger than their Black peers;around half of the Asian teachers were agedless than 35 years, compared to around athird of their Black peers under the age of35. Asian teachers were also less likely tohave been teaching for 10 years or morethan their Black counterparts.

• Just under half of the sample had enteredteaching through the traditional PGCE route,14% through non-traditional routes and 6%had overseas training.

Inclusive and non-inclusive schools• 40% of the survey respondents taught in

schools where less than 5% of the staff werefrom BME backgrounds. This is important tonote because the survey showed that ahigher proportion of BME staff in a schoolwas associated with respondents feeling thatthe ‘school was an inclusive and welcomingenvironment for staff of all ethnic backgrounds.’

• Conversely, the survey showed that a higherproportion of BME pupils in a school wasassociated with a lower proportion ofrespondents (teachers) feeling that the‘school was an inclusive and welcomingenvironment for students of all ethnicbackgrounds’. This was a prevalent viewamong primary school teachers as well asyounger BME teachers and could not beexplained by the data. But it may raise abigger question about the equality oftreatment of BME children in schools.

• Younger (under age 35) BME teachers weremore likely to have ‘positive experiences inschool’ which included feeling valued bymanagers, feeling positive about theappraisal system and feeling that the schoolwas an inclusive environment for them. Thisalso manifested itself in ethnic differences inperceptions of career support, with slightlyhigher proportions of Asian respondentsfeeling supported by their managers in theircareer development and progressioncompared to their Black peers. In addition,Asian teachers were more likely to agree(compared to their Black peers) that staff inthe school were more comfortable talkingabout race/racism.

Career progression• Black teachers in the survey were more likely

to apply for promotion than their Asian peers;40% of Indian and Pakistani teachers hadnever applied for promotion. Black teacherswere also more likely to be successful intheir career promotions. Some of thesepatterns may be explained by agedemographics given the younger age ofAsian respondents in this survey.

• A third of the sample had never applied forpromotion, and over 80% of this group werefemale. However, whilst males were morelikely to apply for promotion, the surveyrevealed that they were more dissatisfiedwith the application process and outcomes,and less likely to agree, than their femalecounterparts, that they were treated equallyin their career promotions.

Views and experiences as BME teachers• The focus group interviews revealed that the

BME participants viewed themselves asimportant ‘role models’ for BME students –both in terms of protecting students from a‘Prevent’/Islamophobic narrative, but also interms of giving them positive role models tofocus on.

• Whilst there were many teachers who werepositive and felt supported by the seniorleadership teams in their school, there werealso many BME teachers, who reportedfeeling isolated and lacking in managementsupport with regards to incidences of racism

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Barriers

and career progression. This was a strongerview among Black teachers (in comparisonto their Asian peers) and was reinforced inthe survey findings.

• BME teachers from all ethnic groupscomplained about being given stereotypicalresponsibilities (e.g. behaviourresponsibilities or Black History Month)instead of challenging intellectual Teachingand Learning Responsibility (TLR) roles. Blackteachers, in particular, spoke about beinglabelled ‘troublemakers’ or being viewed as‘aggressive’ if they challenged any decisions.

• There was unanimous agreement amongstBME participants that there should be moreBME staff in the school workforce generally(and within their schools specifically) butreasons for BME staff representation variedwidely. Most agreed that role models forstudents were desirable, but others wentfurther to argue that it was a necessity toprotect students from being stereotyped ormisunderstood.

The findings from the qualitative researchreinforced the survey findings – with most BMEteachers identifying persistent discrimination,“microaggressions” and unfair and unequaltreatment in their everyday teaching lives. Manyof the reported negative experiences includedbeing denied promotion without institutionalclarity, cultural or racial stereotyping in terms ofteaching roles/extra roles and lack of support orfirm action (e.g. zero tolerance) in relation toracist incidences against staff in school. Acrossthe interviews and surveys, the experience andperception of discriminatory and unequaltreatment dominated the discussions, althoughwithout much prompting BME teachers werealso keen to report positive leadership fromheads and ‘good relationships’ with othermembers of staff.

Structure of the report The main body of the report consists of thefollowing sections:

Chapter 1.0: Introduction – summarises themethodology and research approach

Chapter 2.0: Literature review

Chapter 3.0: Discusses the survey findings

Chapter 4.0: Reports the findings from the focusgroups

Chapter 5.0: Conclusions – draws out the keyfindings and implications of the study

Structural and systemic barriers forBME teachers• Structural barriers such as racism,

including assumptions about capabilitiesbased on racial/ethnic stereotypes,were every day experiences for BMEteachers. In particular, BME teachersspoke about an invisible glass-ceilingand widespread perception amongsenior leadership teams (SLTs) that BMEteachers “have a certain level and don’tgo beyond it”.

• However, there were mixed views aboutthe motivations of SLTs for excludingBME staff from SLT and careerpromotion opportunities; some BMEteachers felt that this was premeditatedto ‘keep them out of the game’; otherBME participants felt that it was perhapsdue to ‘unconscious biases’.

•The damaging long-term outcome of manyof the structural and systemic barriers (tocareer progression) was to lower theconfidence and self-esteem of BMEteachers.

6

Introduction1.1 The current study

1.2 Methodology

1.3 Data analysis

01

01 Barriers

Chapter 1.0:Introduction1.1 The current studyThe government’s own statistics2 indicate thatthere is a stark disparity in representationbetween the number of Black and ethnicminority (BME) teachers in primary andsecondary schools and the pupils that theyteach. Almost one third of pupils in statemaintained primary schools are BME, and justover a quarter of the pupils in state maintainedsecondary schools are from BME backgrounds;this is in sharp contrast to 7.2% of teachersfrom BME backgrounds.3

In addition, the NUT’s own teacher surveys inthe last few years have revealed significantbarriers to progression for BME teachers intheir career progression and pay.4 In thiscontext the National Union of Teachers (NUT)commissioned the Runnymede Trust toundertake a research project to identify theissues and obstacles for Black and ethnicminority (BME) teachers.

This report presents the findings of thequantitative and qualitative study that wasdesigned to elicit some of the key barriers andnegative experiences for BME teachers in Britishschools.

1.2 MethodologyThe research design had both quantitative(survey) and qualitative (interviews) elements tocapture the range of experiences andperceptions of BME teachers across differentschools in Britain.

The surveyThe survey questionnaire was designed by theNUT (after consultation with the RunnymedeTrust) and placed live on the Survey Monkeywebsite for seven weeks between 28 April 2016

and 17 June 2016. The survey link was sent toall registered BME teachers through NUTregional offices and Black members networks.

The questionnaire was targeted at ‘Blackteachers’ (the NUT’s term for all BME teachers)which skewed the results in two ways:

• while other minority ethnic teacherscompleted the questionnaire, the largestethnic group of teachers was Black

• there was no counterfactual (i.e. whiteteachers) to compare the results with.

This limited the analysis in terms of comparingthe career positions and experiences of BMEteachers with their white peers, but also meansthat differences amongst BME respondents inthis survey appear relatively small (because ofthe size of each group).The aim of the surveypart of the study was twofold; firstly, to providewider context about BME teachers’ teachingpositions, roles and experiences within differentlevels of schools in Britain; secondly, to identifyany causes or correlates of career positions andteaching experiences in schools.

The survey covered the following topicareas:

• demographic characteristics (includingprotected characteristics) of therespondents;

• roles and positions of BME teachers inprimary and secondary schools

• experiences of BME teachers withregards to promotion and treatmentacross different levels of schooling

• association between demographiccharacteristics and employment statusand progression.

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2 DfE (2015) School Workforce in England, November 2015, SFR 21/2016, 30 June 20163 Figures from DfE School Workforce Census in England, Nov 2014, Table 5https://www.gov.uk/government/statistics/school-workforce-in-england-november-2014

4 NUT (2015) Pay and Pay Progression, NUT Survey Report for September 2015

01 INTRODUCTION

The questionnaire was designed by the NUT andadministered by the NUT through Survey Monkeywith some advice and assistance from theRunnymede Trust, while the Centre of Dynamicsand Ethnicity (CODE, Manchester University)provided statistical analysis support.

1.3 Data analysis

QualitativeThe analysis of the qualitative data was inbetween focus group interviews and wasiterative in nature, with a number ofopportunities to scrutinise and explore the data.

We used a thematic analysis approach whenanalysing the qualitative data (i.e. usingcategories that clearly emerged from thequantitative data prior to the interviews) as wellas categories that emerged from the literaturereview (and ones we translated into the semi-structured questions). This involved:

• key themes and findings drawn out of theinterviews using a ‘grounded theory’approach. These were then compared withfindings from the initial literature review

• a matrix approach which explored the keythemes, commonalities and similarities in theinterviews with the different respondents

• findings which were ‘reality checked’ andtested with the project team during internalmeetings. This ensured that findings andanalysis addressed the intended researchquestions as well as providing any additionalinsight that may be useful for the NUT

• robust triangulation. The combination of datasources collected for the entire studyallowed for robust triangulation of theevidence, drawing on multiple perspectivesto produce a comprehensive picture of theexperience, perceptions and treatment ofBME teachers.

Quantitative analysisThe statistical package Stata/SE 13 was usedto conduct the full range of statistical analysisincluding:

• univariate analysis i.e. descriptive statistics(frequencies)

• bivariate analysis (e.g. correlation, t-tests,chi-squared tests etc.).

All variables were checked to detect ‘out ofrange’ responses, duplicate records, andmissing values at the beginning of the analysis.The first step in the analysis was to describeand summarise the collected information usingdescriptive statistics. Variables relating to socio-demographic information, experiences within theworkplace, and career progression, weresummarised using frequency distributions andpercentages. All the key variables in this surveywere either categorical (nominal) or ordinalvariables. Bivariate analysis (through inferentialstatistics) was used to test for differencesbetween groups. These tests included Pearson’schi-square test and Wilcoxon rank sum test. Thelevel of significance is conventionally set asa=0.05. In this study, a p-value less than orequal to 0.05 was taken to be statisticallysignificant.

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01 Barriers

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Literature Review2.1 Motivations for entering the profession

2.2 Teacher training

2.3 Issues affecting retention

2.4 The distribution of BME teachers in primary andsecondary schools

2.5 BME teachers’ career progression

2.6 BME teachers and gender

2.7 The curriculum and inclusivity

2.8 Conclusion of the literature review

02

02 Barriers

Chapter 2.0:Literature ReviewThis chapter provides some context from thewider literature to preface the findings in thisreport. It also introduces the issues ofdisproportionality in education (with the under-representation of BME teachers in theworkforce), and the existence of visible andinvisible barriers in career progression for BMEteachers, which frame the analysis andconclusions presented in the report.

Despite the education sector in the UK being thesecond largest public sector employer ofindividuals from BME backgrounds, there isevidence to suggest that ethnic diversity in theteaching force has not kept pace with anincreasingly diverse population in the UK (Steel,2016). In the last decade, the BME population inEngland and Wales has risen from 9% in 2001 to14% of the population in 2011 (ONS, 2012), andthis is reflected in the increasing diversity of thestudent population: 31.4% of primary pupils and27.9% of secondary pupils are from a BMEbackground (DFEa, 2016). Yet, only 7.6% ofteachers are from a BME background (DFEb,2016).

More worryingly, the growth of teachers fromparticular BME backgrounds (i.e. Black Afro-Caribbean, Chinese and Bangladeshi) haveincreased only slightly, by around 0.5% (DFEb,2016) and the distribution of BME teachersacross local authorities varies enormously. Thevast majority of BME teachers are in London;approx. 26% of the teaching workforce in London(and approx. 67% of pupils in London) are fromBME groups in comparison to much lowerproportions in other regions of the country –3.3% of BME teachers in the North West (versus13.2% of BME primary school pupils), 1.2% inthe North East (versus 6.1% of BME students inprimary schools) and 5.1% in the East Midlands(versus 12% of BME primary school pupils).5

A rapid review of the existing literature wasconducted via searches through publishedacademic, third sector and governmentwebsites. The findings are discussedthematically below.

2.1 Motivations for entering the professionEvidence suggests that BME teachers’motivations for entering the profession mirrorthose of their white peers – most notably adesire to serve their community and fulfilment ofchildhood ambitions of becoming a teacher(Cunningham & Hargreaves, 2007). However, anadditional motivation for some BME teacherswas a desire to be a role model for BMEstudents. In 12 focus group interviews (ibid)BME teachers emphasised this was importantfor all pupils but highlighted the potential for apositive impact on BME pupils who may be atgreater risk of underachieving. Teachers fromBlack African Caribbean and Bangladeshibackgrounds specifically cited motivationsstemming from a desire to reform an educationsystem that they felt was ‘dominated by racialinjustices’ (Cunningham & Hargreaves, 2007,p.4). A more recent survey involving over 400BME teachers found that 60% of these teachersbelieved schools did not treat BME pupils fairly(NASWUT, 2016).

2.2 Teacher trainingThe small percentage of teachers from BMEbackgrounds means that in some schools inEngland and Wales there would need to be atenfold increase in the number of BME traineeteachers in order to reflect the diversity of thepupil population (Steel, 2015). However, in 2015only 8% of the trainee teacher cohort on theSchools Direct programme were from non-whitebackgrounds and only 14% of PGCE(PostGraduate Certificate in Education) traineeswere from BME backgrounds (Swift, 2015).

There is scant evidence to explain why thesedifferences in BME participation in postgraduatetraining courses might exist, although studieshave highlighted the unequal treatment, directand indirect racism and relatively poor careerprospects in schools for teachers from BMEbackgrounds in relation to their white peers(Basit et al, 2006; Davidson et al, 2005). A2007 DfES report found that fear of potentialracial abuse from teachers, parents and localcommunities deterred minority ethnic teachersfrom applying for teaching roles in schoolssituated within predominantly white areas, which

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5 FOI request to DfE by The Bureau of Investigative Journalism, 2016; NALDIC, Table EAL and Ethnicity 2013http://www.naldic.org.uk/research-and-information/eal-statistics/eal-pupils/

02 LITERATURE REVIEW

are typically more rural and suburban areas(Cunningham & Hargreaves, 2007). Officialworkforce data indicates this may not only be anissue of self-selection out of teaching in theseareas but also borne out in career progressionexperiences in particular areas. A recent studyby the Department for Education found that BMEteachers who work in urban and inner city areasare more likely to occupy positions of seniorleadership than those based in rural andsuburban areas (DfE, 2016).

Racial bias and discrimination are also barriersthat affect who is recruited into the professionand where. BME teachers who trained andqualified in England and worked in urban andinner city areas reported little to no barriers intrying to enter the profession (Cunningham &Hargreaves, 2007). In contrast, BME teachersattempting to enter the workforce outside ofthese areas reported finding it harder to gainemployment. Likewise, teachers from BMEbackgrounds that had trained and qualifiedoverseas reported barriers in applying for jobsbased on what they perceived as racistrecruitment practices because of their overseastrained status (ibid). This is borne out byacademic evidence that BME teachers, ingeneral, but particularly those trained overseas,are more likely to be employed on temporarycontracts, which denies them employmentbenefits and career progression opportunitiesoffered to permanent staff such as CPD andpaid annual leave (Bush et al, 2006).

Workforce statistical data has also shown thatsome BME teachers (e.g. from Black African andBlack Caribbean groups) are more likely to beolder than their white trainee counterparts whenthey begin teacher training, particularly thoseentering initial teacher training placements (IOE,2010). Research suggests that entering theteaching profession at an older age as well asbeing from BME backgrounds has financial anddomestic ramifications that affect bothrecruitment and retention rates (Basit et al,2006).

2.3 Issues affecting retentionEarlier on this year, the NUT warned of a crisisin the recruitment and retention of teachers:

“Teaching recruitment and retention areboth at dangerously low levels, with many

schools unable to fill vacant posts withsuitably qualified candidates. Increasingnumbers are also leaving the profession.Last year saw the highest number ofresignations for a decade.” (NUT, 2016)

There is increasing evidence to suggest thatteachers, in general, are more likely to leave theprofession within the next two years, citingworkload, poor pay and the accountabilitymeasures that undermine the trust and status ofteaching (NUT, 2016). Research shows that onein four newly qualified teachers have left theprofession three years after qualifying (DfE,2016), and only just over half of teachersgraduating from the Teach First programmesstay on in teaching (Teach First, 2016). BMEteachers, in particular, may be more susceptibleto this as they have reported lower levels of jobsatisfaction and higher levels of stress than theirwhite counterparts (NASUWT, 2014).

2.4 The distribution of BME teachers inprimary and secondary schoolsFigure 1 shows the overall percentage of BMEstaff for each category of the workforce inrelation to the proportion of BME pupils incompulsory state schools. Whilst the figures arenot disaggregated by all levels of teaching staff(these figures are not available by ethnic origin)it highlights the disparity between the proportionof BME teaching staff at each level of teaching(e.g. classroom, deputy, head) compared to theoverall proportion of BME pupils in each periodof schooling (primary and secondary). It isnotable that only 10% of secondary schoolclassroom teachers are of BME origin comparedto over a quarter of BME pupils in secondaryschools, and only 7% of primary schoolclassroom teachers are of BME origin comparedto 30% of BME pupils in primary school.

The government’s own research has shownthat teachers from BME backgroundspredominantly teach in urban and inner cityareas, which often have higher pupilpopulations on free school meals and aremore likely to be considered ‘tougher’schools to teach in (DfEb, 2016). Theseadditional factors may add to the workloadand to the stress levels of teachersteaching in these schools, adding to furtherdissatisfaction with their careers.

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02 Barriers

This imbalance between the ratios of the BMEteaching workforce and BME pupils can have adetrimental impact on all teachers as well asBME pupils. Research by ManchesterMetropolitan University, for instance, has shownthat 60% of newly qualified teachers do not feelprepared to teach in diverse inner city schools,and many white teachers do not feel confident indiscussing race issues in these schools (Hick etal, 2011).7

2.5 BME teachers’ career progressionCareer progression, or the barriers to careerprogression, may also be a factor that affectsboth the recruitment and retention of BMEteachers. Official workforce data hasconsistently shown that BME staff are heavilyconcentrated in the lower level roles, such asclass teacher, compared to the whitecounterparts (Steel, 2015) and the proportion ofBME school leaders is even lower (around 3%)(DfEb, 2016).

Moreover, a study by Clare et al (2016) foundBME teachers were more likely to have requestsfor CPD rejected than their white colleagues.Harris et al (2003) found that BME teacherswere also less likely to be encouraged to applyfor promotion than their white colleagues.Repeated failure to secure promotion or beencouraged to apply can have an impact on self-confidence, which can affect BME teachers’likelihood of seeking promotion and of remainingin the profession (Maylor et al, 2006). Aparticipant in the 2006 study, ‘Black Teachers inLondon Schools’, remarked:

“It’s very rare you see Black headteachers getting the good surburbanschools because you never get throughthe door. It doesn’t matter how good youare or how experienced you are. I meanyou just don’t even get over the interviewstage because the bit about beingCaribbean or Asian gets in the way.”(Maylor et al, 2006)

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BME All white

1000 10 20 30 40 50 60 70 80 90

Classroom and others

Deputies and assistants

Heads

All secondary pupils

Classroom and others

Deputies and assistants

Heads

All primary pupilsNur

sery

and

prim

ary

Seco

ndar

y9.6

6

3.7

26.6

6.5

5

3.2

30.4

90.2

94.1

96.3

73.4

93.4

94.9

97

69.6

Figure 1: School workforce in relation to BME representation of staff and pupils (2015)6

Source: School Workforce Census and School Pupil Census November 2015

6 Percentages do not add up to 100 because figures are included as decimals.7 Hick, P et al (2011) Promoting Cohesion, Challenging Expectations: Educating the Teachers of Tomorrow for Race Equalityand Diversity in 21st Century Schools. Manchester Metropolitan University.

02 LITERATURE REVIEW

The lack of diversity amongst school staff,however, only tells one part of the story aroundcareer progression issues for BME teachers.Research suggests that an additional barrier forBME teachers within schools is the lack oftransparency around recruitment policies andrace equality duties (Clare et al, 2016).

2.6 BME teachers and genderWhile the overall picture shows a lack of ethnicand gender diversity in teaching, the issue is farmore prevalent for BME male teachers whoaccount for only 10.8% of the total teachingworkforce in state maintained primary schoolsand 18.7% in state maintained secondaryschools.8 Evidence suggests BME males areless likely to enter into teaching and when theydo they are less likely to progress into seniorleadership roles compared to their white peers.However, it is important to note that barriersremain for BME females; despite the higherproportion of BME females than males inteaching, they are still less likely to progress tosenior leadership roles compared to all maleteachers (BME and white).

2.7 The curriculum and inclusivityRecent changes to the curriculum have seen areduction in the content on ‘multicultural aspectsof Britain’. These changes have had an impacton teaching with BME teachers reporting that ithas compromised their ‘professional expertise’(Cunningham and Hargreaves study, 2007).African Caribbean teachers in the 2007 study, inparticular, expressed a need for a curriculumand approach to teaching that valued thecultural and social significance of Britain’s BMEcommunities (Cunningham & Hargreaves, 2007).Teachers in the study also expressed concernthat their white peers failed to grasp theimportance of a broader, less Eurocentriccurriculum thus not reflecting the learning needsand interests of a diverse pupil population.9

2.8 Conclusion of the literature reviewThe disproportionately low number of BMEleaders in education highlights a widerdiversity issue within teaching on a nationalscale. The current teaching workforce hasnot diversified with the changing pupilpopulation and has remained a largely whiteteaching force. The teaching profession isalso far from engaging sufficiently with thepertinent issues around the lack of BMErole models for BME pupils and theexperience of racism and discrimination forboth BME pupils and teachers withinschools. If the teaching profession is totruly reflect the needs of the pupils andcommunities it serves then urgent action isneeded to ensure that BME teachers arerecruited, retained and promoted at eachlevel of the profession so that the teachingworkforce is representative of the ethnicdiversity of the population as a whole.

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8 DfE (2015) Table 5, November 2014: Percentages of the head count of regular, qualified, and unqualified, teachers, in statefunded schools by sector, grade, gender and ethnic origin.

9 See also http://www.ourmigrationstory.org.uk/

02 Barriers

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BME Teachers’ Survey3.1 Questionnaire rationale

3.2 Characteristics of respondents

3.3 Diversity of schools and staff

3.4 Teaching characteristics

3.5 Socio-demographic and employmentcharacteristics of participants by ethnicity

3.6 The experiences of BME teachers in primary andsecondary schools

3.7 Attitudes of males and females in the teachingprofession

3.8 Attitudes of younger teachers

3.9 Attitudes of BME teachers in diverse schools

3.10 The link between demographic characteristics andcareer progression among BME teachers

3.11 Conclusions from the survey data

03

03 Barriers

Chapter 3.0: BMETeachers’ Survey3.1. Questionnaire rationaleQuestionnaires were administered for tworeasons in the current study. The first was toprovide a general picture of the demographics,role and responsibilities of BME teachers, and toallow for an exploration of the factors that mightbe associated with poor experiences in schoolsand lack of career progression. For example,there is evidence to suggest that BME teachersare more likely to be in lower teaching positions,be put on lower pay scales and are less likely tobe successful in applications for promotions.However, it is not clear from the currentevidence whether this inequality exists across allBME groups, and/or whether the inequality is areflection of other key demographiccharacteristics (e.g. age) rather than ethnicorigin. It is important to explore these possibleassociations as well, because it could be thatage, length of teaching experience or othercharacteristics are better predictors of teachingpositions, pay scales or lack of progressionrather than ethnic origin.

The second reason questionnaires were usedwas to get a better understanding of the natureof the relationship between demographiccharacteristics and career progression amongstBME teachers.

The questionnaire content and administration areoutlined in Annex A and key results arehighlighted in this chapter. All results discussedin this chapter are statistically significant10

unless otherwise indicated.11

One thousand and twenty-seven teachers (andformer teachers) responded to the NUT surveyof Black and ethnic minority (BME) teachersacross primary and secondary schools and post-16 further education colleges between April2016 to June 2016. The survey was targeted atBME teachers only and is based on a randomselection of BME teacher responses.

3.2. Characteristics of respondentsTable A presents the ethnic breakdown of theBME respondents who self-identified their ethnicgroups (2% of respondents chose not to dothis). Among the 1,027 respondents, teachersof Black Caribbean and Black African ethnicbackgrounds accounted for 27% and 15% of allthose who completed the questionnaire,respectively. These two groups accounted fortwo fifths (41%) of all the respondents. This wasperhaps unsurprising given that the survey waslabelled as a ‘Black’ teachers’ survey’ on SurveyMonkey – thus generating a disproportionateresponse from Black teachers.12

Table A: Ethnic breakdown of respondents

* Due to small sample sizes, mixed ethnic groups of Asianand White, Bangladeshi and Chinese were collapsed intoother ‘Other Asian’; also mixed ethnic groups of BlackAfrican and White, and Black Caribbean and White werecollapsed into ‘Other Black’.

The gender breakdown was 72% female and26% male (with 2% choosing not to state theirgender). This gender breakdown reflects thenational school workforce with three out of fourteachers being female, although there isconsiderable variation among the ethnic groups(Figure 1). Indian, Black Caribbean and OtherBlack groups had the largest disparity betweenthe gender groups with over three-quarters ofthe respondents being female (although it isworthwhile noting that Pakistani, Other Asian andBlack African groups had higher proportions ofmale teachers than the sample average). Therewas more parity between male and femaleteachers within the Black African group with 58%of female teachers and 42% of male teachers.

Ethnic Group Number %

Black African 153 15

Black Caribbean 273 27

Indian 209 20

Other Asian* 132 13

Other Black* 102 10

Pakistani 133 13

Missing 25 2

Total 1027 100

18

10 95% sure that these results are not happening by chance11 The level of significance is conventionally set as a=0.05. In this study, a p-value less than or equal to 0.05 was taken to bestatistically significant.

12 The NUT categorises all Black, Asian and minority ethnic groups as ‘Black’; this survey, however, suggests that therespondents do not perceive themselves this way – and instead many perceive themselves as separate ethnic groups.

03 BME TEACHERS’ SURVEY

The profile of the respondents by age showedthat 420 individuals (41%) were aged 22-35years. There were four individuals aged lessthan 21 years and four aged over 66 years.Eighteen respondents (1.75%) out of 1,027 didnot report their age. However, Figure 2 revealsthat the Asian respondents were on averageyounger than their Black peers; around half of

the Asian teachers (49% of Indian, 50% ofPakistani, and 54% of Other Asian teaching staff)were aged less than 35 years, compared toaround a third of their Black peers under the ageof 35 (29% of Black African, 36% of BlackCaribbean and 38% of Other Black teachingstaff).

19

Perc

enta

ge o

f tea

cher

s

Indian Pakistani Other Asian* Black African BlackCaribbean

Other Black*

Male

Female

25

75

31

69

33

67

42

58

14

86

19

81

Figure 1: Percentage of gender by ethnic origin (England and Wales respondents)

Of the respondents, 42% identified themselves as Christian, 23% as Muslim and 14% of no religion.There were significantly smaller proportions of teachers from Hindu, Sikh and other faith backgrounds(Table B)

Indian Pakistani Other Asian* Black African Black Caribbean Other Black*

35 years or under 36-45 years 46-55 years 56 years or over

Perc

enta

ge o

f tea

cher

s

60.0

50.0

40.0

30.0

20.0

10.0

00.0

Figure 2: Percentage of teachers by age amongst ethnic groups

03 Barriers

Table B: Faith backgrounds of respondents

Analysis of faith by ethnic background revealedthat over half of the Black teachers (from BlackAfrican, Black Caribbean and Other Black)identified as Christian, whilst 48% of the OtherAsian teachers and 90% of the Pakistaniteachers identified themselves as Muslim. Theother Asian group would include teachers fromBangladeshi backgrounds which may explain thehigher proportions of Muslims in this group.

Analysis of other demographic characteristicsrevealed that 93% of respondents identifiedthemselves as ‘not disabled’, 91% heterosexualand 92% as ‘not transgender’.

3.3. Diversity of schools and staffAround three-fifths (60%) of respondents fromeach ethnic group worked within local authorityschools, although this figure was somewhatsmaller (52.5%) for Black African teachers (TableC). It was interesting to note, however, thataround a third of all the BME staff worked inacademy schools as well.

With regards to the diversity of staff, 40% of theteaching staff taught in schools where less than5% of the staff were from BME backgrounds. In

contrast, only 19% of the teachers respondingto the survey taught in schools where less than5% of the pupils were from BME backgrounds. Infact, some 12% (124) of the respondents taughtin schools where over 80% of the pupils werefrom BME backgrounds (see Annex B, Table 3).

A breakdown by ethnic groups revealed thatBlack African teachers were more likely (55%) towork in schools with low proportions of BMEstaff (less than 5%) compared to their BMEpeers; however, a higher proportion of BlackCaribbean teachers (11%) were likely to be inschools where over 40% of the staff were fromBME backgrounds.

In contrast, the highest proportion ofrespondents to work in a school where over80% of the pupil body was BME were teachersfrom a Pakistani background (23%).

3.4. Teaching characteristicsTable D shows the breakdown of respondents interms of their role within schools. While 1,027respondents answered this question, it isimportant to note that respondents were allowedto choose more than one option. The mostcommon role among the respondents (almosttwo thirds) was class teacher, followed bysubject coordinator (approx. 17%) and head ofyear (11%). Only 11 respondents were at headteacher level, most of whom were of AfricanCaribbean origin (six respondents). AfricanCaribbean respondents (33%) were also morelikely to be head of year compared to their BMEpeers.

Religion Percentage NumberChristian 42.2 433Muslim 23.1 237Hindu 7.2 74Sikh 6.3 65Any other 2.9 30No religion 14.4 148

20

Percentages

Types of School Indian Pakistani Other Asian

BlackAfrican

BlackCaribbean

Other Black

Academy 36.5 33.1 33.6 41.1 34.7 32.3

Free school 2.5 1.6 2.4 2.8 1.2 1.1

Independent school 2.0 3.9 2.4 3.6 2.0 1.1

Local authority maintained 59.0 61.4 61.6 52.5 62.2 65.6

Total respondents (N) 200 127 125 141 254 93

Table C: Types of school employment by ethnic group


The majority of the teaching sample (524respondents) worked at secondary school level(51%) with 35% working in primary schools; theremaining respondents worked in nursery, post16 further education colleges and pupil referralunits. Over half of the schools (56%) that theNUT teachers worked in were local authoritymaintained and some 46% were located withinthe London region. Most of the teachers – 84%– did not have early years teacher status and59% did not have a teaching and learningresponsibility (see Annex B, Table 2).

Some two-fifths (39%) of the respondents hadbeen in teaching for over 10 years and one fifthhad been in teaching for between 5-10 years.

In addition, three-quarters of the respondentshad their initial teacher training at a teachertraining institution, 2% via Teach First and 6%within a nominated school via School Direct.With regards to point of entry into teaching,almost half of the respondents (47%) enteredteaching through a Postgraduate Certificate inEducation (PGCE), 18% came direct from ateacher training institution and 14% enteredthrough non-traditional routes by change ofcareer to teaching. Just under 4% (38respondents) entered teaching by becoming ateaching assistant first and 6% (68 respondents)had had their initial teacher training overseas(see Annex B, Table 2). Finally, 57% ofrespondents had held other employment rolesbefore becoming a teacher (see list below forcommon employment areas):

• Teaching assistant• Business and finance• Accountancy and banking

• Retail• NHS and health• Administrative and clerical• Recruitment• Engineering• Academia• Legal• Armed forces• Catering and hospitality• Social care and youth work• Media and TV• Civil servant.

3.5. Socio-demographic and employmentcharacteristics of participants by ethnicityTable 3 (Annex B) reveals that over half of theteaching respondents across the different ethnicgroups worked in secondary schools (52% ofIndian, 56% of Pakistani, 61% of Black Africanand 51% of Black Caribbean) and within localauthority maintained schools. The majority ofrespondents across all the ethnic groupsconducted their initial teacher training at ateacher training institution. Black Africanrespondents (12%) were among the highest ofthose respondents whose initial teacher trainingwas from overseas, compared to other ethnicgroups (5.1% of Indian, 1.5% of Pakistani, and6.9% of Black Caribbean). However, Figure 4shows that a higher proportion of Blackrespondents have been teaching for ‘10 yearsor more’ (average of 44% across the Blackgroups) compared to their Asian counterparts(average of 36%). In fact, 16% of Indian andPakistani respondents had only worked as ateacher for under one year compared to 10% ofBlack African and 8% of Black Caribbeanteachers in the survey.

21

Table D: Distribution of teaching roles within primary and secondary schools

Indian Pakistani Other Asian

BlackAfrican

BlackCaribbean

Other Black

Total

% % % % % % (N)

Teaching assistant 8 23 15 31 23 0 13

Class teacher 22 14 14 15 25 10 647

Head of department 18 14 9 20 27 12 112

Head teacher 18 9 9 0 54 9 11

Assistant head teacher 17 7 3 13 57 3 30

Head of year 27 16 8 6 33 10 51

Subject coordinator 24 14 13 8 30 11 171

03 Barriers

Figure 4: Years of teaching by ethnic origin

Figure 5: Point of entry into teaching by ethnic origin

Figure 5 shows that over half of the Indian(52%), Pakistani (58%), Other Asian (60%) andBlack African (56%) respondents enteredteaching through the PGCE qualification route, incomparison to 41% of Other Black and 43%

Black Caribbean teachers. In contrast, a higherproportion of the Other Black and BlackCaribbean teachers (41% and 43%, respectively)entered teaching directly through teachertraining institutions.

22

0

10

20

30

40

50

60

Year

s of

teac

hing

Under 1 year Between 1 year and 3 Between 3 years and 5

Between 5 years and 1 10 years or more

Indian Pakistani Other Asian* Black African Black Caribbean Other Black*

0 10 20 30 40 50 60 70 80 90 100

Other Black*

Black African

Other Asian*

Pakistani

Black Caribbean

Indian

Direct from teacher training institution PGCE after university

Teaching assistant School Direct

Change of career Other

26

25

16

11

16

18

41

43

56

60

58

52

13

19

12

12

16

13

Percentage


3.6. The experiences of BME teachers inprimary and secondary schoolsRespondents were asked why they wanted tobecome a teacher within a closed multi-choicequestion (Table E). All 1,027 respondentsanswered this question, although many teacherschose more than one motivation. The mostpopular reason for becoming a teacher was ‘tomake a difference’ (485 respondents), followedby always wanting to be a teacher (353respondents), and ‘role model to others’ (334respondents).

Table E: Motivations for becoming a teacher (N)*

*Figures presented in N and not % as many teachers chosemore than one motivation

Table F (below) presents the results from severalquestions exploring ‘experiences in theworkplace’ among the respondents; the resultscompare the experiences of BME teacherswithin primary and secondary schools. Overallthe results suggest that BME teachers withinprimary schools are likely to have more positiveexperiences in their schools compared to theirpeers in secondary schools. However, we needto be cautious because whilst there are somedifferences in experiences among BME teachersbetween the primary and secondary schoollevel, these differences are not always‘statistically significant’ (i.e. 95% sure that theseresults are not happening by chance). So forinstance, more BME teachers at the primary

school level (73%) agreed with the statementthat ‘overall I enjoy working in the teachingprofession’ compared to BME teachers at thesecondary school level (66%), but thesedifferences were not statistically significant (p-value 0.09). Similarly, more BME teachers at thesecondary school level (35%) disagreed with thestatement that ‘my line manager supports me inmy career development and progression’compared to BME teachers at the primaryschool level (28%), but once again thesedifferences were not statistically significant (inother words these differences were more likelyto have occurred by chance).

Answers where differences between primary andsecondary school were statistically significantincluded statements such as ‘my managersvalue my contribution and recognise mystrengths’ (half of the BME respondents based inprimary schools agreed with this statementcompared to 44% based in a secondaryschools) and ‘the appraisal system is supportiverather than punitive’ (50% of BME teachersworking in secondary schools disagreed withthis statement compared to 40% working inprimary schools) Similar patterns were observedbetween primary and secondary schools for thequestions such as ‘my school/college is a goodplace to work’, ‘I feel I can be myself at work’, ‘Ifeel included by my teacher colleagues’ and ‘theschool I work in is an inclusive welcomingenvironment for staff of all ethnic backgrounds’.One interesting nuance in the results was thatprimary schools (compared to secondaryschools) were considered more inclusive andwelcoming environments for BME staff, whereassecondary schools were considered moreinclusive and welcoming environments for BMEstudents than primary schools.

23

Tell us why you decided to become a teacher? Total (N)

Always wanted to go into profession 353

Passion for my subject 328

To make a difference 485

Teachers in my family 133

Role model to others 334

Agree Neither disagree nor agree DisagreeSchool types (%) (%) (%) Total

Overall I enjoy working in the teaching professionPrimary 73 14 13 344Secondary 66 17 17 494My manager values my contribution & recognises my strengths*Primary 50 23 27 345Secondary 44 20 36 496

Table F: Experiences of BME respondents by primary and secondary school (continues overleaf)

Agree Neither disagree nor agree DisagreeSchool types (%) (%) (%) Total

The appraisal system is supportive rather than punitive*Primary 30 30 40 342Secondary 23 27 50 493I would tell my friends and family that my school/college is a good place to work*Primary 42 25 33 345Secondary 33 24 43 494I feel I can be myself at work*Primary 52 21 27 344Secondary 42 22 37 496I feel included by my teacher colleagues*Primary 66 17 17 345Secondary 54 25 21 496My line manager supports me in my career development and progression*Primary 42 30 28 344Secondary 40 25 35 496My total working hours are acceptablePrimary 18 15 67 341Secondary 22 14 64 487The balance between my home and work life is about rightPrimary 15 14 71 340Secondary 13 14 72 487In the last 12 months I have considered leaving my school because of workload*Primary 62 17 21 338Secondary 63 14 23 487In the last 12 months I have considered leaving the teaching profession because ofworkloadPrimary 68 12 20 340Secondary 65 15 20 487The school I work is an inclusive welcoming environment for staff of all ethnicbackgrounds*Primary 58 19 24 302Secondary 44 25 31 442The school I work is an inclusive welcoming environment for students of all ethnicbackgrounds*Primary 31 4 64 298Secondary 42 6 51 433The staff are comfortable when talking about race or racism at your schoolPrimary 29 41 30 263Secondary 27 44 29 403The school is proactive in identifying and responding to racism affecting pupils in yourschoolPrimary 32 34 8 269Secondary 32 31 12 403

* denotes differences are statistically different at the 5% level

03 Barriers

24

Table F continued: Experiences of BME respondents by primary and secondary school


3.7 Attitudes of males and females in theteaching professionTable 7 in Annex C presents the genderbreakdown of different experiences in theworkplace. Overall, the results suggest that, ingeneral, female teachers are more likely to havepositive experiences in their schools than theirmale counterparts. So for instance 71% offemale respondents agreed that they enjoyedworking in the teaching profession, compared to61% of their male counterparts.13 A higherproportion of female respondents (50%) agreedthat they could be themselves at work than thatof their male counterparts (39%). Over half ofthe female respondents agreed that the schoolthey work in was an inclusive welcomingenvironment for staff of all ethnic backgroundscompared to 37% of males.14

3.8 Attitudes of younger teachersTable 8 in Annex C explores associations betweenage groups and ‘experiences within theworkplace’ as BME teachers. Our results suggestthat younger BME teachers (aged under 35) aremore likely to have positive experiences in theirschools. So for instance, 75% of respondentsaged under 35 years enjoyed working in theteaching profession and this was higher than thatof any other age group (e.g. in contrast, 62% of36-45 years enjoyed working in the teachingprofession)15. Over half of the youngestparticipants agreed with the statement that ‘mymanager values my contribution and recognisesmy strengths’, which was among the highestacross all age groups (in contrast, 43% of 36-45year olds agreed with this statement). Similarpatterns were found for other aspects ofexperiences at workplace such as ‘the appraisalsystem is supportive rather than punitive’, ‘I wouldtell my friends and family that my school/collegeis a good place to work’, ‘I feel I can be myself atwork’, ‘I feel included by my teacher colleagues’,‘my line manager supports me in my careerdevelopment and progression’ and ‘howcomfortable do staff seem to be when talkingabout race or racism at your school’. However,while younger teachers (under 35) were morelikely to agree to the statement that ‘the school I

work is an inclusive welcoming environment forstaff of all ethnic backgrounds’ (59% of youngerteachers agreed with this statement), they wereleast likely to agree that ‘the school I work is aninclusive welcoming environment for students ofall ethnic backgrounds’.

3.9 Attitudes of BME teachers in diverseschoolsWe also analysed different ‘experiences in theworkplace’ across schools with differentpercentages of BME staff (see Table 5, Annex C)to ascertain whether there are differences inexperiences in schools that are more or lessdiverse. Overall, our results showed that therewere more positive experiences (e.g. mymanager values my contribution and recognisesmy strengths; I would tell my friends and familythat my school is a good place to work) inschools with higher proportions of BME staffcompared to schools with lower proportions ofBME staff. The results also revealed that therewere significant variations in ‘feeling included byteacher colleagues’ across schools withdifferent proportions of BME staff;16 the higherthe concentration of BME staff within schools,the more the respondents felt the school was‘an inclusive welcoming environment for staff ofall ethnic backgrounds’. Interestingly, however,this pattern did not exist for the statement ‘Theschool I work is an inclusive welcomingenvironment for students of all ethnicbackgrounds’ – the results revealed that schoolswith higher proportions of BME staff areassociated with lower levels of agreement thatthe school is a welcoming environment forstudents of all ethnic backgrounds. However,more respondents (over 30%) agreed with thestatement that ‘my school is proactive inidentifying and responding to racism affectingpupils in schools with higher proportions of BMEstaff than in schools with lower proportions ofBME staff (less than 28%).

In addition, statements relating to ‘experiencesin the workplace’ was also analysed in relation todifferent percentages of BME pupils. The resultsrevealed that whilst there were differences in

25

13 (c2=7.83, df=2, p-value=0.02)14 It is worthwhile noting that we also translated the five-point Likert scale responses to experiences at workplace into ordinalvariables and ran Wilcoxon rank sum tests. The results were consistent with that of the intial chi-square tests.

15 (c2=18.16, df=6, p-value=0.006)16 (c2=16.83, df=8, p-value=0.03)

(c2=21.12, df=10, p-value=0.02)

My line manager supports me in my career development and progression

Disagree Neither disagree nor agree Agree Total

(%) (%) (%) N

Indian 29 24 47 193

Pakistani 40 25 35 125

Other Asian 20 31 49 122

Black African 38 24 38 136

Black Caribbean 32 31 37 258

Other Black 26 32 42 95

03 Barriers

experiences in schools (e.g. the appraisalsystem is supportive rather than punitive; I feel I can be myself at work) with differentproportions of BME students, these differenceswere not statistically significant. Once again,however, we found that there were significantdifferences in responses to the school being aninclusive welcoming environment for students ofall ethnic backgrounds, where more respondentsagreed with this statement for schools withlower proportions of BME students compared tohigher proportions of BME students.

The finding that schools with higherconcentrations of BME students and BMEteachers are associated with the perception thatthe school is less inclusive for BME students issomewhat unexpected, and cannot be explainedentirely by the quantitative data. However, it mayreflect other hidden characteristics (e.g. morechallenging inner city schools within poorerneighbourhoods) that are not measured by thisquestionnaire, but are themselves highlycorrelated to schools with high concentrationsof BME students or secondary schools with BMEteachers.

We explored the association between ethnicityand experiences within schools for the BMEteachers in this survey. The analysis revealedthat whilst there were differences in theseexperiences among the BME groups, most ofthe differences were not statistically significant.Interestingly, however, this was not the case with‘my line manager supports me in my careerdevelopment and progression. Table G presents

these results and shows that there are ethnicdifferences in responses to ‘my line managersupports me in my career development andprogression’ with Black and Pakistani teachersless likely to agree to this statement.

Table G shows that of the 929 respondents whoanswered this question, 49% of Asian teachersand 47% of Indian teachers agreed that theirmanager supported them in their careerprogression. This was in contrast to only arounda third of Black African teachers, BlackCaribbean teachers and Pakistani teachers wereagreed that their manager was supportive oftheir career progression. In addition, ouranalysis (see Table 9 Annex D) revealed thatAsian teachers (41% of ‘Other Asian’, 39% ofIndian and 25% of Pakistani teachers) were morelikely to agree that staff seemed comfortablewhen talking about race or racism at theirschool compared to their Black counterparts(20% of Black African and Black Caribbean).

3.10 The link between demographiccharacteristics and career progressionamong BME teachers Figure 6 shows the number of applications forpromotion made by the male and femaleteachers in this study. Out of 926 responses, athird of the teachers (313) had never applied forpromotion. A disproportionate number (259 or83%) of these teachers who had never appliedfor promotion were female. Overall, mostrespondents (out of 926) had applied 1-3 times(424), although men were still more likely thanfemales to apply.

26

Table G: Ethnic breakdown on career support (percentage)


27

Figure 6: Number of applications made for promotion, by gender (percentage)

In your teaching career, how many times have youapplied for promotion?

%

35

25

15

50

504540

30

20

10

None 1-3 times 4-6 times 7 times ormore

Male (%)

Female (%)

Conversely, males were more dissatisfied withthe application process and outcomes. Theproportion of female respondents who reportedtheir application was treated fairly ‘every time Ihave applied’ (23.5%) and most of the time(20.5%) was, on average, higher than that oftheir male counterparts (15% and 17%,respectively). Male respondents (64%) were alsomore likely to disagree that their managers intheir schools/colleges treated ‘all teachersequally when it came to opportunities for careerprogression’, compared to 54% of their femalecounterparts. There were also more malerespondents (66%) who agreed they had toleave their current school/college to progresstheir career than their female peers (53%).17

Just over one in ten (11%) of those teacherswho had applied for promotion were successful‘every time I have applied’, although the genderdifferences were not statistically significant. Thiswas also the case (i.e. not significantdifferences) for those males and females whohad never been successful.

Table 11 in Annex E explores the associationbetween age and different domains of careerprogression among our sample of BMEteachers. The results show statistically

significant age differences in most domains ofcareer progression (such as the number ofapplication for promotions, the number ofsuccessful applications for promotion, whetherthe respondent feel their career has met theirexpectations etc.) with over 35 year olds morelikely to apply for promotion than under 35 yearolds and more likely to be successful forpromotion. However, the pattern was reversedwith regards to higher percentages of over 35year olds feeling that their careers had not mettheir expectations, that they had not beenencouraged to gain skills required for moresenior roles, that managers in their schoolswere less likely to treat teachers equally when itcame to career promotion and that they neededto leave their current schools to progress theircareers.

Table H (overleaf) presents the results exploringthe relationship between ethnicity and careerprogression among BME teachers in this survey.Overall, the results show that among the 914respondents who completed these questions,there were statistically significant differences inthe number of application for promotionbetween ethnic groups.18 Most of therespondents had applied between 1-3 times forpromotion (over 40% of the respondents).

17 see Table 10, Annex E18 c2=30.70, df=15, p-value=0.01

03 Barriers

28

Table H: Number of applications for promotion by ethnic origin (percentage of each group)

Q: In your teaching career, how many times have you applied for promotion?

% % % % % %

Number ofapplications

Indian Pakistani Other Asian Black AfricanBlack

CaribbeanOther Black

Never 38 38 45 32 27 32

1-3 times 46 44 41 49 45 50

4-6 times 10 15 13 10 20 11

7 times or more 6 3 1 9 7 7

Total (N) 192 123 116 134 255 94

Amongst this group, Black African teacherswere the most likely to apply for promotionbetween 1-3 times (49% compared to the otherethnic groups). Interestingly, also, the proportionof Black participants who applied for promotion7 times or more (9% of Black African and 7% ofBlack Caribbean) were higher than that of Asiancounterparts (6% of Indian and 3% of Pakistani).Conversely, almost 40% of Indian and Pakistaniteachers had never applied for promotion – amuch higher proportion than their Blackcounterparts (32% of Black African and 27% ofBlack Caribbean teachers had never applied forpromotion).

While it’s difficult to ascertain the reasons behindthis disparity, one possible reason may be thatAsian teachers, were on average, younger(under 35) compared to their Black peers, andtherefore, teachers who were much earlier intheir career compared to their Blackcounterparts. Our previous results alreadyshowed that older teachers (over 35s) were

more likely to apply for promotion compared totheir younger peers.

Figure 7 (opposite) shows that there weredifferences (which were statistically significant)in the number of successful applications forpromotions between the ethnic groups.

Around a half of most of the BME respondents(except for Black Caribbean teachers) had‘never’ been successful in their application forpromotion. Of the BME teachers who had beensuccessful in their promotion ‘most of the time’,Black African (10%), Black Caribbean (19%) andOther Black (15%) teachers were moresuccessful than their Asian peers. The successstory was more mixed ‘every time I applied’ withteachers of Indian (14%) and ‘Other Black’ (16%)origin, on average, more successful than theirother BME peers. Interestingly, over half of the(53%) Other Asian and ‘other Black’ group hadnever been successful in their applications forpromotion.


Figure 7: Number of successful applications by ethnic group (percentage)

How many times have you been successful in your applicationfor promotion?

Indian Pakistani Other Asian Black African Black Caribbean

Never Some of the time Most of the time Every time I have applied

%

50

40

30

20

10

0

60

29

However, despite the differences in theapplication and success rates of different ethnicgroups in gaining promotion, we found therewere no (statistically) significant ethnicdifferences in their views around careerexpectations, whether they perceived theirpromotion application to be treated fairly or not,whether they felt they had been encouraged to gain the skills needed for more senior roles or whether they felt that teachers had been treated equally by managers regardingopportunities for career progression (see Table 12, Annex E).

3.11 Conclusions from the survey data

3.11.1 The relationship betweendemographic characteristics and type ofemploymentWe explored the relationship betweendemographic characteristics and factorsreflecting ‘employment conditions’ (e.g.employment status, type of employmentcontract, annual salary and teaching andlearning responsibility, TLR). With regards togender, our results showed that there were nosignificant differences between men and womenin this sample with regards to their employmentstatus, type of contract, salary and teaching and

learning responsibilities (see Annex E). However,this was not the case in relation to age.Analyses by age and ‘employment conditions’revealed that younger teachers (under 35s) weremore likely to be directly employed by theschool (83%) compared to their older (46-55year olds) counterparts (66.5%), but less likelyto be agency teachers (7%) compared to their46-55 year old counterparts (11%). Thesedifferences were statistically significant.Previous demographic analysis also revealedthat Black teachers (particularly Black Africanand Black Caribbean respondents) were, onaverage, older than their Asian peers in thissurvey with around two-thirds of Black teachersover age 35 compared to around a half of theirAsian counterparts.

Somewhat unsurprisingly, older teachers (above35s) were more likely to be on salaries above£30,000 compared to their younger peers,although older teachers (above 46 year olds) inthis sample were more likely to be on lowerannual salaries (£10,000 to £20,000) comparedto their younger peers. This may reflect part-time status among some of the olderrespondents, although this information was notavailable in the data.

03 Barriers

3.11.2 The link between ethnicity, gender,age and career progressionWe also analysed various employmentcharacteristics – employment status, type ofcontract, salary, teaching and learningresponsibility (TLR) status and length of teachingby ethnic origin in order to get a betterunderstanding of the differing career (promotionand salary) success rates amongst the ethnicminority groups. Interestingly, whilst there wereslight differences in employment status (by theschool or Local authority), employment contract(permanent, fixed term etc) and teaching andlearning responsibility status among the BMEgroups, these differences were not statisticallysignificant. However, this was not the case withsalary bands or length of teaching, where therewere statistically significant differences amongthe BME groups.

On average, just over half of the Asian teacherswere on salary bands over £30,000 comparedto between two-thirds and three-quarters of theBlack groups (two-thirds of the Black African andBlack Other teachers were, on average, onsalaries over £30,000; nearly 75% of BlackCaribbean teachers were on salaries over£30,000). In fact, a higher proportion of BlackCaribbean respondents (a third) were earningover £40,000 (compared to around 20% of theAsian groups) and 10% of Black Caribbeanteachers in this survey were earning an annualsalary of over £50,000 – the highest proportionamong all the other ethnic groups. Furtheranalysis revealed that part of this explanation forsalary differentials may lie in the length ofteaching records amongst the ethnic groups. As Figure 4 showed, a higher proportion ofBlack participants (average of 44% of Blackteachers) had been teachers for 10 years ormore compared to their Asian counterparts

(an average of 36% across Asian teachers).Moreover, among the Black respondents, ahigher proportion of Black Caribbean teachers(50%) had been teachers for over 10 yearscompared to their Black and other ethnicminority peers.

It is also worthwhile noting that there werestatistically significant differences in the pointsof entry into teaching amongst the BME groups(see Figure 5) with over half of Indian, Pakistaniand Black African teachers reporting that theyentered teaching after gaining a PostgraduateCertificate in Education (PGCE) after university,compared to 43% of Black Caribbean teachersand 41% of Black Other teachers. In fact, aquarter of Black Caribbean and Black Otherrespondents (higher than any other ethnic groupin the survey) entered teaching directly throughteacher training institutions.

These demographic differences and entry intoteaching between the ethnic groups are morelikely to explain some of the substantivedifferences between the BME ethnic groups inthis study, more than ethnic origin in itself.However, it doesn’t explain differences entirely –in particular, around experiences in school –such as feeling supported by managers andfeeling that staff in their schools are comfortabletalking about racism etc.

In these responses there are differencesthat cannot be explained by this quantitativedata alone, but suggest (see qualitativeresults in the next chapter) that racismagainst Black teachers (in particular) stillpersists in the education system, isendemic and is a norm in their everydayexperiences within schools.

30

01

The Qualitative Study4.1 Day to day life as BME teachers in schools

4.2. Impact of racism on teachers

4.3. The impact of the ‘Prevent’ agenda on teachers

4.4. Career progression – visible and invisible barriers

4.5. The impact of performance related pay on BMEteacher career progression

4.6. Increasing the recruitment of BME teachers

04

04 Barriers

Chapter 4.0: TheQualitative StudyThis chapter outlines the key themes that aroseout of three focus group interviews with 15 self-identified BME teachers as well as answers toseveral open ended questions in the survey. Thefocus groups took place across two cities, twoin the Midlands and one in London. Overall, weinterviewed five male and 10 female teachers; ofthis group, 11 participants identified themselvesas African Caribbean (five participants), Black(one), Black British (four) and African (one). Theremaining participants identified themselves asAfrican Indian, mixed race Black and White,British Pakistani and Asian. Just over half of theinterviewees had been teaching for over 16years (n=8). As three-quarters of the focusgroups were participants from Black ethnicbackgrounds, we need to be cautious about thegeneralisations that we infer from theseinterviews as they may reflect the experiencesof Black teachers more specifically, rather thanteachers from other ethnic minoritybackgrounds.

The themes explored included the experiencesand treatment of BME teachers in schools (inrelation to pupils and staff); the impact of racismand racial inequality; and the recruitment,retention and career progression of BMEteachers in primary and secondary schools.BME teachers were also asked (on thequestionnaire and within the focus groups) whatpossible solutions might help to address someof the perceived inequality of treatment anddiscrimination within their schools.

4.1 Day to day life as BME teachers inschoolsOf the 15 teachers interviewed, and includingthe questionnaire respondents, a largeproportion had been teachers for over 10 years(approx. 40%) and around a third had beenteachers below five years. The length of theirteaching experience, however, appeared tomake little difference to their passion forteaching and to their commitment to students:

“I really enjoyed teaching and because Ithink BME students need role models.”

(African Indian teacher, male, secondary schools)

But the interviews revealed that whilst theircommitment to the students continued, theirpassion for teaching was slowly wavering due tothe pressures of workload and cutbacks ineducation:

“The burnout rate is very high in schoolsnow; members of staff leaving indroves…”

(African Indian teacher, male, secondary schools)

However, the BME teachers were also keen tohighlight the reasons why it was important tohave diversity in the school workforce, and inparticular amongst the senior leadership teams:

“Definitely yes; we should have more BMEteachers. BME students should havemore BME teachers to provide them withrole models. And other BME teachers canact as a peer support system. And wecan counter an increasingly Eurocentriccurriculum.”

(Black British teacher, female, secondary school)

“They don’t realise that ethnic minoritychildren need role models from their owngroup. If the children see SMT (seniormanagement team) as being all white andthe cleaning staff from ethnic minorities,that is all they aspire to be. Especially ifthey do not see people around them ormembers of their families in seniorpositions.”

(Response to a question about schoolsidentifying and responding to racism

affecting pupils in schools)

“Senior leadership tends to be middleaged white middle class people who havebeen teachers all their lives. They areoften unable to understand thecomplexities of these issue and studentsare less likely to relate when all theirsenior staff are the ‘same’.”

(Indian teacher, male, 36-45 years,teaching 5-10 years)

Whilst there was unanimous agreement thatthere should be more BME staff in the schoolworkforce generally (and within their schoolsspecifically), reasons for BME staff

32

04 THE QUALITATIVE STUDY

representation varied widely. Most agreed thatrole models for students were desirable, butothers went further to argue that it was anecessity to protect students from beingstereotyped or misunderstood:

“To counter the prevailing narrative thatdoesn’t reflect the students…I am one ofthe few male Muslim staff in the school,and I didn’t fast during Ramadan – thatchallenges a stereotype of Muslim malesnot observing Ramadan.”

(African-Indian teacher, male, secondary school).

However, when asked specifically about theirtreatment in schools from other members ofstaff, the responses were mixed, with someBME teachers spontaneously vouching for theirwhite peers and head teacher in their schools:

“I work in a school with a majority Asianpupil population. But there’s also Blackand mixed race pupils and EasternEuropean and White British. And the BMEstaff are not marginalised; the head is anadvocate of equality.”

(Mixed Black and White teacher, female, secondary)

“Staff in my school are welcoming andinclusive although it is obvious they arenot used to having a wider mix ofethnicities in the school. What made merealise this was that children and staffwere constantly confusing me with oneother Chinese teacher at the beginning ofthe year but it was not intentional. Theymake a huge effort to apologise andcorrect each other/students. There are afew issues in my school but I can honestlysay I do not feel excluded in any waybecause of my race. They have workedvery hard to build an inclusiveenvironment.”

(Response to an open-ended questionabout how schools identify and respond

to racism)

But the predominant view amongst BMEteachers (with regards to their responses on thequestionnaire and within the focus groups) was amore challenging school environment in whichthey often had to deal with the daily indignities of“microaggression”19 from other teachers andstudents:

“Some staff or [sic] disappointinglyignorant and do not realise that they carryimplicitly racist views which are usually ill-thought-through. There is casual racismwithout intention to harm, but lack ofintent to harm doesn’t do much if harm iscaused.”

(‘Other Asian’ teacher, male, 36-45 years, teaching 5-10 years)

“Some staff have made very disparagingremarks regarding differentraces/religions.”

(Pakistani teacher, female, 22-35 years old, teaching 1-3 years)

“There’s a ‘them and us’ divide betweenstaff. All teachers need to be able tosocialize and adapt…”

(Black Caribbean teacher, female, primary school)

And the cumulative effect of these“microaggressions” – intended or unintended –made many of the BME participants feel isolatedand uncertain about their role in school:

“I felt the school was institutionally racist,but as the only BME staff member I wasunsure if and how to challenge it.”

(British Pakistani teacher, male, 6-10years of schooling, secondary school)

On a few occasions it reinforced a feeling of‘othering’; one Black Caribbean teacher recallsbeing asked, ‘Why do Africans have more boychildren?’ – as though there was somethingunusual or ‘odd’ about African culture. Moreover,these subtle instances of covert racism madeher feel frustrated and alienated:

33

19 Term ‘microaggression’ was used by Chinese American psychologist Professor Derald Wing Sue to refer to ‘brief andcommonplace daily verbal, behavioral, or environmental indignities, whether intentional or unintentional, that communicate hostile,derogatory, or negative racial slights and insults toward people of color. Perpetrators of microaggressions are often unaware thatthey engage in such communications.’

04 Barriers

“…it’s difficult to always confront andchallenge – because you don’t want toseem aggressive. You always feel aconflict between wanting to challenge andwanting to get on and progress…”

(Black Caribbean teacher, female, over16 years of schooling, primary school)

This tension between challenging racistbehaviour and ‘turning a blind eye’ alsoappeared to be exacerbated by the perceptionthat the BME teachers would be ‘labelled’ aspotentially ‘challenging’ or ‘aggressive’, thusleaving them feeling impotent from confrontingunacceptable views or behaviour from othermembers of staff or students:

“I’m not sure if it’s ethnicity, but if a BMEteacher challenges anything, and is beingassertive and confident – they areperceived as maverick, aggressive andthreatening.”

(Mixed Black and White teacher, female, teaching over 16 years,

secondary school)

4.2. Impact of racism on teachersAs well as experiencing ‘microaggressions’and/or ‘casual’ racist or stereotypical remarksfrom other members of staff, BME teachershighlighted the challenges in confronting racistremarks from students. For some teachers ithighlighted the conflict they felt with their ownethnicity and their roles:

“What are you? A Black teacher[experiencing racism] or a teacher first.”

(Black British teacher, female, supply teacher, secondary school)

But for other teachers, it accentuated a lack ofsolidarity/support and recognition of theseriousness of the incidences from othermembers of staff within their schools:

“I witnessed name calling (students toteachers), and when it was reported, itwas ignored.”

(Indian teacher, female, teaching over 10 years, secondary school)

“Some teachers refuse the ‘n’/’p’ wordfrom students and challenge, othersignore. The only incidents reported are ofBlack children using such language. A

white student said to me “whatevern*****”. And although I reported it, Iended up resolving the issue with thestudent and reconciling the futurerelationship with no support from SLT. Todate unsure if even recorded. Head ofdept didn’t intervene either.”

(Response in an open-ended question onwhether the school identifies and

responds to racism)

Several teachers shared their frustration aboutincidences of racist behaviour towards thembeing treated as ‘behavioural issues’, thusdiminishing the seriousness of the offence:

“Incidences of racism from students aremet with silence. One student was veryracist towards me, but the student wasdealt with in terms of ‘a behaviouralincident’. Students are punished in linewith other behavioural issues, but shouldracism be dealt with more punitively?There is no attempt either to deal withstudents and teach them why racism iswrong.”

(Black British teacher, male, teaching forunder five years, secondary school).

“Comments will be flagged up asbehaviour, but nothing further.”

“The school underplays it saying theincident is not racist but rudeness.”

(Responses in open-ended question from the questionnaire)

Staff reported feeling unsupported during theseinstances, and moreover, felt that there was norecourse for them – once again leaving themisolated in their experiences:

“Incidents with students are recorded, butstaff have no idea of situations or how todeal with race.”

(Open-ended response from questionnaire)

Importantly, this was not the experience of all ofthe BME teachers in this study. Both thequalitative and the quantitative studies revealedthat whilst overall the experiences of many BMEteachers within schools was a feeling of isolationand lack of management support with regardsto incidences of racism (witting and unwitting),there were also many teachers who feltcollectively supported by the SLT:

34


“There is a zero tolerance policy againstracism in my school.”

(Response to an open-ended questionabout the school identifying and

responding to racism)

“We are an inner city multi-cultural schoolthat promotes acceptance for allcommunities. Of course, we have had todeal with children using racial slurs, butwe also try to pre-empt this behaviorthrough PSHE lessons.”

(Indian teacher, female, teaching forunder three years)

A common theme linked to positive experiences,however, was the pivotal role of the headteacher in sending a ‘collective’ message ofsupport and ‘zero tolerance’ to the wholeschool:

“Any racism must be reported to the headteacher. It is logged and there aremeetings.”

(Open-ended answer)

“The head’s leadership speaks to theethos and that trickles down to the rest ofthe school. The message is then it is notindividual but collective responsibility.Without head teacher buy-in race equalitypolicies become a tick box exercise, seenas good practice but not followed throughsatisfactorily.”

(Mixed Black and White teacher, female, teaching over 16 years,

secondary school)

Interestingly, one teacher suggested thatresilience to racism within schools depended notonly on the support structures within schools butalso on your experience and career success asa teacher:

“Whether you can tackle racism – subtleand overt – is dependent on yourenvironment – and where you are in yourcareer.”

(Black British teacher, female, supply teacher, secondary school)

4.3. The impact of the ‘Prevent’ agenda onteachersWhilst many teachers reported incidences ofracism – direct and indirect – within theirschools, several teachers from Muslimbackgrounds raised issues around Islamophobiaand ‘existing misconceptions’ about them. Onthe one hand, Muslim teachers argued that itwas important to have Muslims among the staffto ‘counter and control an Islamophobicnarrative about schools being taken over byfundamentalist Muslims’ and to protect Muslimstudents who were ‘trying to keep their headdown during the Trojan Horse scandal’.20

“Prevent is so strong that teachers feelthat disagreeing with them is seen ascondoning extremism and there ispressure to ‘watch’ Muslim students andtheir work.”

(Other Black, female, secondary school teacher)

But conversely, other Muslim teachers spoke oftrying to break stereotypes of Muslims by notacting in ‘conventional’ ways (i.e. not fastingduring Ramadan). The emphasis on ‘Prevent’,and in particular, on Muslims, however, left themfeeling ‘conflicted’ about their roles as teachers,and as members of Muslim communities.

In addition, teachers (notably from other ethnicbackgrounds) argued that the ‘Prevent’ agenda –with its focus on ‘counter-terrorism andextremism’ undermined their ability to addressand tackle incidences of racism in schools:

“Students feel they can be blatantlyracist, and there are no consequences forthem. These extremist views are notcovered in the Prevent agenda becausethey are not seen as “extremism” [in thecountering terrorism sense]; they are nottaken seriously, and they are justsomething that BME teachers experienceon a regular basis.”

(British Black teacher, female, teachingfor up to 15 years, secondary school)

35

20 ‘Operation Trojan Horse’ in Birmingham

04 Barriers

For many Muslim teachers the issue of Preventwas particularly significant in the context of the2016 EU referendum campaign (when this studytook place) during which time there was anincrease in hate crime against Muslims andEastern European immigrants.

Several BME teachers in this study reported anincrease in racist behaviour amongst pupils (andin some cases parents) during the Brexitcampaign, and admitted that they wereconflicted in how to deal with the ‘normalisation’of racist attitudes:

“During the campaign, students felt it wasacceptable to openly express potentiallyracist or xenophobic views to BMEteachers in our school; I’ve had studentssaying I support BNP…”

(British Black teacher, female, teachingfor 11-15 years, secondary)

4.4. Career progression – visible and invisible barriersFocus group participants were asked variousquestions about their career progression: hadthey ever applied for promotion? Had theircareers met their expectations? Did theyperceive there to be any barriers toprogression? And to what extent they had feltsupported or unsupported by the SLT within theirschool? All of the participants in the qualitativestudy had applied for promotion one or moretimes in their career and a few participantsreported that their careers had met with theirexpectations and been supported strongly bysenior members of staff:

“I’ve had a very positive experience. I’vebeen promoted. Staff are very supportiveand the head takes equality seriously. I’mthe only Asian member of staff but thereis no divide.”

(Asian teacher, female, teaching for over16 years, primary school)

“Positive experience for me – I was headof department in my NQT year. I waspromoted by mentoring in apredominantly white SLT.”

(Black British teacher, male, less than fiveyears teaching, secondary school)

But for many other teachers the barriers to theirprogression felt insurmountable and rangedfrom passive resistance/lack of support toactive discouragement and resistance.Moreover, these barriers were persistent andalmost every teacher had crossed more thanone or more of these hurdles at one stage oranother of their career. In addition, BMEteachers (in both open-ended questions and thequalitative study) were keen to point out thatthere were also ‘access’ issues that preventedthem from even being in a position to apply forpromotion in the first place, such as beingdenied equal CPD opportunities:

“BME teachers are not offered the sameopportunities given to other colleaguesfor training and promotion.”

(Black Caribbean teacher, female,teaching more than 10 years)

Other BME teachers reported barriers whichwere more covert and hidden in ‘implicitpractices’ such as not being able to teach ‘coresubjects’ which would facilitate their careerprogression or being promoted initially quicklybut then subsequently undermined by beinggiven responsibilities for challenging areas andstudents in the school:

“At the beginning I had the oppositeexperience in that I was newly promotedto second in charge of the department.But now I’ve been given additionalresponsibilities for behaviourmanagement in Key Stage 4 and for Year11s re-sitting their GCSEs. Both thesegroups are difficult groups, but I wasgiven these responsibilities despite tellingthem that I didn’t want them… I think itstems from stereotypes they [school]have of Black men as more intimidating –KS4 is the toughest year group. But it issubtly reinforcing stereotypes. We getgiven the tough behavioural jobs, but notthe intellectual challenges andresponsibilities.”

(Black African teacher, male, less thanfive years of teaching, secondary school)

36


Moreover, this stereotype existed across bothgenders, with Black female teachers alsoexpressing dissatisfaction with being given‘challenging behaviour classes’ because it wasperceived as ‘their area of expertise’.

Other additional workloads which would take upconsiderable time, but were not rewardedfinancially or in terms of career progressionincluded ‘Black History Month’ and ‘anything’related to BME students – ‘You become thespokesperson for everything BME.’ (Black Britishteacher, female, supply teacher, secondaryschool). Many BME teachers, however,described this burden as a ‘double-edged sword’– on the one hand finding it personally fulfillingbecause ‘you can bring experiences of your ownculture; get children to ask questions aboutCulture; to lead on faith and Black Historymonth’, but on the other hand, ‘having to dealwith difficult conversations; you become thementor for BME, given classes with the mostchallenging behaviour. It’s the result ofstereotypical assumptions.’ (African Caribbeanteacher, female, between 6-10 years ofteaching, primary school)

Several teachers also reported a sense ofexclusion (i.e. their ‘face not fitting in’) becausethe SLT was often made up of largelyhomogenous white staff:

“We have mixed staff, but an all-whitesenior leadership team.”

(Indian teacher, male, teaching between5-10 years)

These were inferred to be ‘invisible barriers’preventing BME teachers from applying:

“You have a place [in relation to careerprogression] and you don’t go above it.”

(Black British teacher, female, over 16years of teaching, secondary school)

And, moreover, these invisible barriers,appeared to affect their confidence and self-esteem, leading to BME teachers self-selectingout of seeking further promotion:

“You ask yourself, can you compromiseyour values? Can you be quiet [to be partof the SLT]? Do you fit in?”

(African Caribbean teacher, male,teaching more than 16 years)

Some BME teachers reported feeling ‘activelydiscouraged’ by the whole process because notonly were they not ‘actively’ encouraged to applyfor more senior jobs when they arose (incomparison to their white colleagues), but theywere also given other, less rewarding andstereotypical roles to keep them ‘out of thegame’:

“You’re being pushed towards certainroles and responsibilities because ofperceptions of BME teachers, while othercolleagues are being mentored andencouraged towards other areas. Butyou’re offered other distractions, andkeep you off balance. Make you acceptthe status quo and remain disadvantagedin comparison to your white peers. Youdon’t know how to respond, how tochallenge – leave or wait?”

(Black Caribbean teacher, female,between 11-15 years teaching, primary

school)

Of those teachers who tried to apply forpromotion (without encouragement) they notedthat the process continued to be ‘unsupporting’with senior leadership teams making them feel‘self-conscious and naive’ for trying to getfurther up the ladder:

“I did an MA degree as I was not happywith my career progression; I wanted tosee if that would change anything. And Itook on extra responsibilities without anymonetary reward or recognition. But whenI mentioned to the head teacher that Iwanted a promotion, he said, ‘didn’trealise you wanted that. Why would youwant that?’ He described the pay increaseas ‘peanuts’ and gave me lots of excusesfor why I shouldn’t apply for promotion.I’ve never spoken about these issuesbefore, but I’m here today because I feel Ineed to say something…I feel it’sunconscious, but it’s professionally-hiddendiscrimination.”

(British Pakistani teacher, male, between6-10 years of teaching, secondary

school)

37

04 Barriers

Moreover, several teachers observed that therewas little recourse to complain if they had notbeen promoted as discrimination was often‘subtle’, ‘covert’ and difficult to pinpoint:

“There are no overt racist incidences. Ihave direct experience of being the mostqualified for the job, but not beingappointed. And then latterly filling the gapby acting as head, while they advertisedthe post again. But they paid me £10kless than the advertised salary, and Ididn’t get the job.”

(African Caribbean teacher, male, over 16years of teaching, secondary school)

“There was no justification [for lack ofpromotion]. She [fellow BME teacher] wasproducing good grades and meeting herperformance targets…I think it was herassertiveness; senior management didn’tlike it.”

(Mixed race Black and White teacher,female, teaching over 16 years]

Other BME teachers pointed out that even if youdid have the confidence to complain about anyperceived inequality of treatment, the reactionby SLT was unsupportive and damaging:

“My independence was perceivednegatively by senior leadership – that Iwouldn’t be willing to play the game…andtherefore I was labelled a troublemaker.”


The perception that somehow BME teacherswere unwilling to ‘play the game’ and beinglabelled a ‘troublemaker’ was prevalent acrossthe BME teachers, suggesting thatcharacteristics of ‘assertiveness’ had becomeracialised in relation to them.

“If a BME teacher challenges anything,and is being assertive and confident –they are perceived as maverick,aggressive and threatening.”

(Mixed race, Black and White teacher,female, over 16 years of teaching,

secondary)

Moreover, this consistent and subtle labellingseems to lead to teachers somehowinternalising this stereotype, and questioningtheir own judgements and behaviour:

“I blame myself. It makes you wonderwhether it’s a personal problem ratherthan racial when you’re overlooked interms of career progression. How muchof that is that I just don’t fit?”


4.5. The impact of performance relatedpay on BME teacher career progressionIn general, participants in the study were notsupportive of the recently imposed payprogression framework. Whilst most agreed thatit was important to be a ‘good teacher’, therewere many reports of being overloaded withwork under the new capabilities procedures,thus placing enormous ‘pressure’ on teachersand making a work-life balance difficult to obtain.Some teachers viewed it as a ‘special measurescriteria’ – used more in a punitive sense than asa reward or incentive. Others speculated thatexperienced or well-paid BME colleagues wereput on capability processes to ‘facilitate’ theirdeparture from the profession in order to savemoney:

“The capability issue puts a lot ofpressure on staff. This leads to teachersleaving the profession altogether….it’sbeing used as a punitive measure or topressure staff to leave. But it’s beingapplied to BME staff disproportionately,and those who are older and more highlypaid – and those who have had ahistorically long, good track record.”

(Black teacher, female, over 16 years ofteaching, primary school)

Several BME teachers also argued thatperformance-related pay disproportionatelyaffected BME teachers because of the contextsthey often worked in:

“There is little opportunity to progress astargets are ridiculous – particularly givenschool contexts and cohorts of classeswhere BME teachers work.”

(Black British teacher, male, teachingunder five years, secondary school)

38


Teachers were also asked about the potentialimpact, if any, of the decentralisation measures(e.g. increasing number of academy schools,free schools etc) on their careers andexperiences in schools. Most teachers reportedthat they were too ‘overwhelmed’ with workloadand competency pressures to reflect upon theramifications of decentralisation, but manynoted that it would likely exacerbate raceequality gaps for BME teachers (i.e. in careerprogression) as accountability for race equality(under Public Sector Equality Duties (PSED)) werelikely to be poorer in more autonomous schools:

“BME staff are already hindered with theircareer progress under local authorities,but with academies, there is noprotection.”

(African Indian teacher, male, secondary school)

“With local authorities, there is at leastsome recourse in relation todiscrimination and the PSED.”

(Black African teacher, male, less thanfive years of teaching, secondary school)

“My local borough were successful onrequesting, under FOI further informationon academies. But we need to go furtherand get data on pay and ethnicityequality.”

(Black British teacher, female, over 16years of teaching, primary school)

“Get rid of performance related pay whichcan be used as a racist tool. I have seengreat Black teachers being forced out ofthe profession stressed by the process ifthey do not meet targets, leaving beforetheir careers are ruined by this process.Monitor the number of Black teacherswho are leaving due to the appraisalprocess so they can see howdisproportionate it is.”

(Response from an open-ended questionin the questionnaire)

Other teachers discussed the potential impact ofTeach First21 in this context, suggesting that itwas a programme that was unlikely to be arecruitment vehicle for more BME teachers:

“BME students are not going touniversities where they are being pickedfrom…instead it’s white teachers fromprivileged backgrounds.”

4.6. Increasing the recruitment of BMEteachersTeachers were asked in both the qualitative andthe quantitative study what more theGovernment and schools could do to encouragethe recruitment of BME teachers into theteaching profession. The answers werespontaneous and impassioned, althoughinterestingly there was disagreement aroundsome of the suggestions, such as quotas:

“We need quotas…”

(Black Caribbean teacher, female,between 11-15 years of teaching,

primary school)

“No! I’m against quotas; it won’t work.”

(Black British teacher, female, over 16years of schooling, primary school)

“You need name- and age-blindapplications – this could mitigate some ofthe bias in shortlisting. Should have toshortlist at least some BME candidates,in the way they do with equality…”

(Black British teacher, female, teachingover 16 years, primary school)

“Nothing! We should not have any form ofpositive discrimination.”


39

21 A programme where graduates receive six weeks of intensive training before being placed in schools for two years under aleadership development programme

04 Barriers

Nevertheless, one of the more popularsuggestions was around senior leadershipteams (SLTs) better reflecting the staff diversityin their schools:

“Should have a certain percentage of thesenior leadership team with Black staffdepending on the percentage of Blackstaff teaching in the school. We have oneAsian member of staff in the senior teamin the last 10 years and that’s a joke.”


“Ensure that teaching staff especiallySMT reflect the population of the school.One of Ofsted’s criteria should be lookingat the proportion of Black teachers atdifferent levels in relation to the ethnicbackground of the children.”


Having targeted measures and mentorshipprogrammes for BME teachers was also apopular suggestion:

“Need more shadowing and mentoring…train the governors to be reflective ofwhat a head looks like…in [my] area thereare a lot of Black deputies but no heads.”

(African Caribbean teacher, female, over16 years of teaching, primary school)

“Offer a Black mentor, not necessarilywithin your school but a local area oronline.”


However, several teachers pointed out thattargeted programmes should be tailored ratherthan aggregating all BME groups together:

“They should encourage Asian males toget involved as well as Black teachers.This could be achieved throughunderstanding all teachers are different &not trying to mould us into the same.”


Other BME teachers suggested increasing theaccountabilities for SLTs or governors to beresponsible for who they recruit into theirschools:

“Make head teachers and governorsmore accountable and active in recruitingand retention. Also raise the profile of theequal opportunities policy because at theminute it has got lost in the inclusionpolicy.”


Finally, there were many suggestions about theimportance of role models for BME recruits:

“Show more role models in advertisingand TV.”


“More Black teachers in recruitmentpublicity – and not just for inner cityschools.”


“Get Black teachers into secondaryschools and colleges to speak to youngpeople to inspire them to becometeachers.”


“Establish strong local support networksfor Black teachers outside of London.Include race and equality issues as partof NPQH and other training for schoolleaders. Raise the profile of successfulBlack head teachers.”


40

04

Conclusions

05

05 Barriers

Chapter 5.0: ConclusionsThis report was commissioned to get a better understanding of the everyday experiencesfor BME teachers in British schools and to identify some of the barriers to their careerprogression. In order to get a fuller understanding of the issues, the Runnymede Trustworked closely with the NUT to administer a survey of NUT BME members (in order to get a notion of breadth of issues) and to undertake three focus group interviews (toascertain depth) with BME teachers in two cities. As discussed in previous chapters, there were a few methodological limitations to the study – we could not compare theexperiences of BME teachers with their white counterparts (control group), and we had an over-representation of Black teachers (compared to their representation in the national workforce) in the survey – but even after taking these limitations into account, we believe the detailed findings from this study further illuminates what it is like to be aBME teacher in British schools.

The findings from the questionnaire provide evidence to suggest that althoughdifferences in teaching positions and career progression exist among BMEgroups, some (but not all) of these differences can be explained bydemographic characteristics – namely age, point of entry into teaching andlength of teaching experience.

We cannot be certain that these are the only factors that ‘explain’ differences(as our questionnaire covered only a few demographic variables) but‘statistically significant’ associations existed between these demographicvariables and promotion success. However, the questionnaire findings alsohighlighted a disparity between some of the experiences of Black teachers inschools in comparison to their other ethnic minority peers – that is, Blackteachers, on average, feel they have less managerial support and are lesspositive about the appraisal system compared to their Asian peers.

These are important findings, because whilst Black teachers were more likelyto apply for promotion and gain promotion success in this study (which islikely to be correlated to their age and teaching experience), they weresignificantly less positive about the ‘process’ of applying for promotionscompared to their Asian peers.

42

05The qualitative study, whilst undertaken with a small number of participants,reinforced some of the key findings from the quantitative (survey) study – namelythat institutional racism – often manifested in subtle and covert‘microaggressions’ by senior staff– still plays a key part in the barriers to careerprogression for Black teachers in many British primary and secondary schools.

This is not to say that teachers from Asian backgrounds do not experiencediscrimination in schools – as many Asian respondents in our study similarlyhighlighted the detrimental impact of ‘casual stereotypes’ and Islamophobia (fromboth staff and pupils) on their confidence and self-esteem in their careers andpromotions, but it does suggest that the experience of racism is particularlyinsidious and persistent for Black teachers in this study.

Both the quantitative and qualitative study, however, revealed that whilst BMEteachers believed that racism and discrimination was still endemic acrossprimary and secondary schools, it was clearly not always witting and deliberatein its practice. This not only suggests that senior leadership teams may beunaware that they are discriminating against BME teachers, but also that theymay be able to change some of their day-to-day practices to ensure that they arenot unwittingly excluding members of BME staff from their teams and decision-making processes.

Finally, it is important to note some of the other findings from both thequantitative and qualitative study – namely that BME teachers, regardless of theirage, length of teaching and ethnicity, were passionate about their roles asteachers. Teachers admitted that they felt ‘overburdened’ and demoralised by therecent reforms to pay structures and the current approach to capabilityprocedures (and some suggested that these reforms were disproportionatelyaffecting BME teachers), but they strongly felt that BME students needed ‘rolemodels’ to progress and succeed in life. In addition, whilst there were manyexamples of racial discrimination and isolation in schools by other staff andsenior leadership teams (in both the quantitative and qualitative studies), therewere also many reports of positive and collective support by SLTs, and zerotolerance to racism by head teachers and leaders within schools.

43

01

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06

46

06 Barriers

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NASWUT (2014). The Big Question: An opinionsurvey of teachers and school leaders. London:NASWUT

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06 REFERENCES

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