Why We Need a Learner’s Charter

Professor Gus JohnAssociate Professor & Honorary Fellow

Institute of EducationUniversity of London

17 June 2011

The Case for a Learner’s Charter

The British schooling system is in crisis

Successive governments behave as though they are scrambling to grab whatever is within reach in order to prevent the boat from going under

The process does not engage with students

The Case for a Learner’s Charter

Unlike most of the other government services that impact upon children’s lives, schooling is compulsory

The Case for a Learner’s Charter

Parents face sanctions, including being sent to jail, for not making sure their children attend school, irrespective of whatever parenting challenges they themselves might be grappling with

The Case for a Learner’s Charter

School students are not a homogenous group any more than parents are. They come from a multiplicity of backgrounds defined by ethnicity, social class, gender, disability, language, religion and belief, geography, post code, level of literacy of parent(s), their own experience of the schooling system, etc.

The Case for a Learner’s Charter

Different categories of schools have admission procedures that act as a filter, ensuring that they admit only those students whose backgrounds they see as compatible with the regime they are operating and the profile they want to project to the ‘market’

The Case for a Learner’s Charter

At its root, our schooling system is one that extends and perpetuates social exclusion

The Case for a Learner’s Charter

Crucially and irrespective of their background, one thing is common to all school children: they bring what they are and

they are what they bring

The Case for a Learner’s Charter

Some are competent learners who know how to learn, how they learn best and how to challenge themselves and stretch teachers to enable them to perform to the height of their ability

Others are challenged by learning and lack the capacity to form positive relationships with their teachers and other learning facilitators

The Case for a Learner’s Charter

Some take responsibility for creating a safe and supportive environment in which teachers and students could teach and learn

Others make it their business to create the environment in which they function best and which makes no demands on them but hinders others’ capacity to teach and to learn

The Case for a Learner’s Charter

Irrespective of their disposition, ALL are required by law to attend school

This raises a number of key issues and questions:

The Case for a Learner’s Charter

• What is the purpose of schooling and education?

• Does every child have an education entitlement?

• When do they forfeit that entitlement?

The Case for a Learner’s Charter

• Does EVERY child really matter?

• When do they cease to matter enough so as not to have their needs met, however complex, and their rights safeguarded?

The Case for a Learner’s Charter

Some Issues:• Schooling and the notion of shared

values in a liberal democracy• equity• entitlement• equality of access

The Case for a Learner’s Charter

• equality of ability to exercise choice• the capacity of school students and their

parents to influence decision making and effect desired outcomes, irrespective of class and professional status

• a commitment to eliminating educational disadvantage and the social exclusion that is a concomitant of it, and

The Case for a Learner’s Charter

• crucially, the role of elected government in guaranteeing the defence of the individual against invidious forces that do not necessarily respect the rights and entitlements of those who cannot fend for themselves, or who constitute the excluded in society

The Case for a Learner’s Charter

Education is a fundamental human right. It is not a privilege to be granted on the basis of social class, racial or ethnic origin, wealth, religion and belief, age, sex or physical ability

The Case for a Learner’s Charter

Education is not just for acquiring high grade examination results, equipping people with skills for the workplace, or for positioning the nation to be high up in the global league table of economic competitiveness

The Case for a Learner’s Charter

It is for developing in people the skills and competences to take control of their own lives and to function as responsible social citizens, demanding and safeguarding their own rights, having due regard to and respect for the rights of others, and embracing their responsibilities to themselves, their families and to society

The Case for a Learner’s CharterInternational Human Rights Standards The best interests of the child must be paramount (Article 3) Children have a right to be heard (A.12) Children have a right not to be discriminated against on the

basis of, for example, class, race, ethnicity, religion/faith or gender (A.2)(OR because of the failings of either parent)

Children have the right to be protected from all forms of violence. They must be kept safe from harm. They must be given proper care by those looking after them (A19)

The best interests of the child must be paramount (Article 3) Children have a right to be heard (A.12) Children have a right not to be discriminated against on the basis of, for example, class, race, ethnicity, religion/faith or gender (A.2)

(OR because of the failings of either pare

The Case for a Learner’s Charter

We need a Learner’s Charter both to underpin the fundamental rights and education entitlement of children as learners and to connect them with their responsibilities to themselves, to their parents, teachers and peers

A Charter for Learners

Challenges• Cyberspace• Creative media• Reality TV• Popular culture• Subversion/displacement of family values• How to fill the gap

The Case for a Learner’s Charter

A Learner’s charter that could serve as a school student’s personal compass for navigating their way through: - the myriad claims on their allegiance; their social interactions at school, at home and in the community and, above all, the phases of their own self development

The Case for a Learner’s Charter

I believe that each school, irrespective of status, should be required to adopt and operate a Learner’s Charter of the sort I am proposing

That Learner’s Charter should be a companion document to each student’s school handbook

The Case for a Learner’s Charter

As such, I am appealing for support from the teaching profession and from all sections of society for the proposal that the Department for Education adopt the Learner’s Charter and issue it as Statutory Guidance for schools as one way of delivering ‘Every Child Matters’.

Prof Gus John07539 476041profgusjohn@gmail.com

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