Conference 2000Scotland
Travellers’ Families from
Home-School Partnerships
A challenge for School Boards
1.1
Introduction
This
contribution focuses on the situation of Travellers
and the problems in their interface with state
education. They remain the single largest group of
illiterate and unqualified people in Europe, with
consequent reduced life chances within an
increasingly sophisticated and affluent society.
Research has shown that the reasons for their current
situation are varied and complex, with
Travellers’ cultures and life-styles, including
high levels of mobility for many in addition to the
overt prejudice and discrimination they meet from the
dominant groups, being crucial factors. Bullying is
endemic in schools and Travellers
‘difference’ makes them easy targets yet
society shows little will to tackle such serious
problems.
School
Boards (and similar institutions) have an active role
in setting the ethos of ‘their’ school yet
they, even unintentionally, may reflect narrow and
insular views especially when they have little
knowledge of the diversity within their client group.
Training is undoubtedly needed in how to be
representative of all in the school community and
providing generic services in a pluralist society may
make it more difficult to find and retain people
willing to take on the task of guiding and supporting
their school into an inclusive role.
2.1
Background to the Current Situation
Since at
least 1975 the European Parliament has voiced its
concern at the continued marginalisation of
Traveller, itinerant and migrant groups in European
state education facilities. Despite the increased
free school places for the 5 – 16 age group (and
in many cases beyond) there was little evidence of
any improvement in the situation when reports were
commissioned in 1987 to identify the reality of the
situation: "School Provision for Gypsies and
Travellers" by Jean-Pierre Liegeois and
"The Education of the Children of the Itinerant
Population in the Twelve Member States of the
European Community. Fairground Children." by
Ludo Knaepkens.
As a
result of these reports, two seminal Resolutions were
passed in 1989 which were to underpin the policy
thrust and funding initiatives of the European
Parliament, principally the intercultural and later
SOCRATES programmes. Many trans-national partnerships
were funded for projects with a focus on the
identified key issues but principally on developing
materials to raise awareness of Traveller groups,
their history and contribution within the larger
settled society and the discrimination and racism
which they meet in access and uptake of school
provision and the role of education in redressing the
problems.
The
European Resolutions confirmed Travellers’
rights to the same public services as the dominant
society but further demanded special measures to help
ensure that Travellers enjoyed equality of
opportunity in realising their rights. The European
Commission required each state to submit an account
of the actions undertaken to the end of 1991 and
these were subsequently published in 1997. They do
not make comfortable reading for those who believe
that education is for all. Since 1997 further actions
have been demanded, including a greater emphasis on
training for Travellers to act as mediators for their
groups and to train as teachers and for all teachers
to have training in Travellers’ particular
educational needs. This information has barely
percolated to local authority level and rarely at
individual school and school board level yet the
Treaty of Maastricht binds us to these actions.
3.1 The
Problems and some Paradoxes in Addressing them
While it
was important to establish and highlight
Travellers’ very specific, special or particular
needs it also brought a degree of exposure and
limelight which many Travellers had not sought and
often did not want. They had survived many centuries
of often brutal and repressive legislation, usually
by keeping a low profile, a degree of separateness
and by being ‘unseen’ as they went about
their lives.
The
price they paid has been exclusion from most of the
public services we take for granted, e.g. health and
education, including disenfranchisement from voting,
access to public libraries, having a voice on public
platforms etc. Thus it has been difficult for them to
counteract the largely racist stereotyped images of
them presented in the media.
Travellers
an out group
If you
lead a largely mobile life-style where do you belong?
Where are your roots? In settled society such
questions are fundamental to ‘placing’ new
acquaintances and colours how they are viewed. For
Travellers this is not a meaningful or helpful
concept: ‘belonging’ for them is not about
a place it is about being members of a family, an
extended family or related group. They are
constructed by settled society as not belonging to
the community, of a school, village or urban area.
They are ‘outsiders’, often ostracised and
unwelcome, with accusations of ‘not paying
taxes’ and ‘leaving a mess behind
them’, except for other than the shortest of
stays such as when the Circus or Shows arrive for a
few days. Gypsy Travellers not on official sites are
quickly moved on elsewhere so there is little
opportunity to settle into school or the local
community.
If one
is not seen to belong or stay long-term in a place
how does one get involved with the School Board or
similar organisation? For Gypsy Travellers it is
virtually impossible; for Occupational Travellers,
there is little real involvement in the
‘settled’ decision-making groups.
For some
Travellers there are advantages in remaining
separate; ethnic boundaries are more easily preserved
when there is an ‘other’ or
‘enemy’ to avoid and cultural cohesion and
distinctiveness are more easily maintained when
little better alternatives beckon. Regular schooling,
with all its advantages and opportunities, may well
threaten the very existence of traditional Traveller
life-styles, as has been the case for other ethnic
groups who, when once integrated into schools, are
subsequently assimilated into the dominant society.
They may well have a lot to lose and perhaps little
to gain since those who are seen to succeed at school
are predominantly from the ambitious, educated and
empowered groups within society.
Apart
from the obvious difficulties of mobility and the
consequent frequent changes of schools Traveller
parents lack the necessary ‘cultural
capital’ to readily take advantage of state
schooling. Many are unschooled or have only attended
school intermittently. For some their experience of
school has ranged from the demeaning experience of
total social rejection to a lack of academic success
leading to reduced self-esteem. Thus for many the
relevance of the school is questioned as it is for
other groups with similar negative family experience,
often leading to disaffection and truancy. How are
such perspectives reflected in School Boards? Are
School Boards a mechanism for ensuring that dominant,
indigenous, settled views and values are supported
and promoted?
Parental
responsibilities, culture and mobility
While
European legislation upholds and confirms
Travellers’ ethnic and cultural life-styles it
does not propose that ordinary schooling is any less
relevant for them, and the only concession to their
mobility in Scotland is that Travellers’
children may be withdrawn from school to accompany
their parents ‘while legitimately travelling for
work’, providing there is regular attendance
during the over-wintering period. This pattern dates
back to the days when Traveller life was geared to
the agricultural calendar and its attendant Fairs.
The Scottish Office (SOEID) has not yet taken
cognisance of the Travellers’ changed patterns
in earning a living.
Travellers
now recognise that literacy, numeracy and some
vocational qualifications are essential but there is
still a strong belief that families themselves have
the key responsibility in educating and inducting
their young people as active, competent members, into
their society and traditional practices; as with
musicians and dancers, the training for Circus acts
has to begin at a very early stage. The close empathy
and interdependence required in the team work
undertaken in all Travellers’ work demand high
levels of daily practice under the direct control of
the experienced elders. Such closeness has other
benefits. No elderly Traveller is left alone or
neglected; equally, individual suffering and death
affect many more than the immediate relatives. For
these reasons the requirement to educate their
children to the State’s satisfaction creates a
tension between satisfying their own societal
cultural existence and the perceived advantages of a
school education. For them the value of formal book
learning has not been ‘proved’,
particularly where the deferred long term rewards of
paper qualifications can lead to a lowered
performance in traditional family skills and cultural
interactions. It is ironic that the moral and social
values which they (and settled society) value are
seen to be better secured outside of schooling.
Mobility
brings difficulties which under present school and
curricular organisation have a major impact on
continuity and coherence in teaching and learning.
Even for the most ‘deserving’’ of
absentees, e.g. the child with chronic illness, the
inevitable result of interrupted attendance’s
seems to be reduced achievement. This does not
necessarily imply that more attendance would be the
resolution but rather that adequate and effective
alternatives to support learning while out of the
classroom are actually essential for many pupils at
some time. The latest SOEID paper on Special
Educational Needs shows a recognition of this.
"Clarification should cover authorities’
responsibility for pupils at home, absent from school
or outwith the home area through long term or
periodic illness and recuperation".
But for
the absentee who is viewed as
‘non-deserving’, whose parents support and
condone absences, blame and censure are attributed
with few calls to offer relevant alternatives to
motivate and engage the learner and the family. How
is a School Board to react to the demand for public
revelation of attendance and achievement levels,
especially when the school which successfully
maintains and supports the learning of a previously
little or unschooled group it may be compared
unfavourably with a similar school which does not
meet this challenge and has better statistics to
show? Quantifying a narrow set of indicators tells a
different story to the reality of a qualitative
shift. The new Setting Targets initiative. will test
headteachers’ (and School Boards?) abilities to
cope with the impossible task of setting targets for
children who may enrol at any stage at any time and
for any length of stay, often with limited or no
previous school experience. Rather than receive
censure for low levels of achievement such a school
should be praised for attracting and supporting
Traveller enrolments.
What
is a good school?
Travellers,
in common with other parents, exercise their right to
choice of school. They use word of mouth and prior
experience to identify supportive learning and social
environments for their children. Schools which
receive regular requests from Travellers to enrol and
experience subsequent revisits are good schools. In
any unhappy or negative experience they simply walk
with their feet and are rarely pursued. Do School
Boards take cognisance of such positive, if
unrecorded affirmation, or of the dissatisfaction
being expressed through rejection of the school? They
ought to for HMI inspections now regularly include
queries on Travellers’ presence and attendance
rates. They take care to record the good practice
they see at encouraging and supporting Traveller
pupils. Any school with an official Traveller site or
Fair nearby yet having few Traveller enrolments
should be reviewing their practice and set targets to
actively increase enrolments as well as attendance
and achievement levels. What responsibility do School
Boards have in ensuring that all children in their
locale are enrolled at a school or are otherwise
educated? Are there legal implications or is it more
a social and moral issue? What advice or instructions
are they given on this?
At
European level it has been recognised that for
children to enrol in several different schools each
session is counter-productive to achieving their full
potential. Nevertheless there is a reluctance to
force individual states to face the inherently
exclusive nature of the predominance of
‘local’ schools: local signifies the
integrative nature of school in its community, yet
local can mean parochial and inward looking with
self-regarding and self-protecting practices
dominating if no will exists to ensure equity for all
who can make a legitimate claim to a school place. At
present, although guidance has been given to all
local authorities in Scotland, Travellers still do
not enjoy a legal right to maintain their place at a
winter-base school while they are away travelling for
the summer season. Such overt discrimination against
an accepted life-style and ethnic and cultural values
is considered a rights issue but leaves individual
families exposed and at the mercy of chance and
individual good will. Who should monitor the right to
a meaningful education? Is there a role here for the
School Board in evaluating its school’s
effectiveness?
4.1
Partnerships, Positive Progress and Possibilities
Despite
the serious difficulties for Travellers and for
schools there are some signs of progress, albeit on a
piece-meal basis throughout Europe.
For the
Show Travellers in Scotland the last five years have
been ones of steady pressure but slow improvements.
The Glasgow winter-base schools welcome them and
support their learning within the limits of the
flexibility of their staffing and resources. Show
pupils now are assured of remaining on the roll while
travelling and in secondary schools subject choices
are made before moving out in the early spring so
that places are reserved for their return in
October/November. Schools provide packs of materials
to accompany the children, to be completed and
returned for marking. But this is only a stop gap
measure; children need teaching and such packs are
not true ‘open or distance’ learning
materials.
This
problem has now been recognised and attempts made to
redress the situation through joint European
initiatives using SOCRATES and Leonardo funds. While
some States have Unions and Associations of
Occupational Travellers they were not able to lobby
successfully for educational reforms on an individual
basis. The need for concerted action prompted the
initiation of the European Federation for the
Education of Occupational Travellers (EFECOT) in
1989. Since then it has acted as a clearing house for
information, lobbied directly with the European
Parliament, negotiated with the European Commission
and secured funding for very many transnational
projects focused on the educational needs of
Travellers. The wishes, needs and aspirations of the
various disparate groups are brought together and
workable solutions are developed and piloted by
committed educationalists. In a sense EFECOT performs
for its client groups some of the functions that a
School Board does for its parents; it promotes their
interests, represents their case and mediates between
providers and clients. EFECOT promotes partnerships:
between families, Travellers, unions, teachers,
associations, schools, colleges and universities,
governmental and local authority departments. The
developments in understanding, in appreciating and
recognising the problems inherent to a mobile life
style and in developing teaching methodologies have
been commendable. But there is evidence that not all
government departments have acted to effect positive
change. In Scotland the last piece of advice was in
April 1989, although STEP, funded by the SOEID, has
disseminated information and guidance to all local
authority education departments. In England the DfEE,
through the Section 488 funds promotes Traveller
Education Support Services (TESS) as positive support
for Travellers but not all LEAs participate in the
scheme.
In the
Netherlands central government funds support a
network of travelling schools which accompany the
larger fairs. All children are required to attend
regularly. The families on the smaller fairs must
send their children to any school within a 15
kilometre radius and have the right to a place and
teaching during that short spell. In France families
can claim vouchers to buy government devised distance
learning materials to support their children’s
education while travelling and have access to tutor
support provided at special centres. Perhaps
Australia can lay claim to the most appropriate model
of learning support. In Central Queensland lobbying
by the Show parents, principally the mothers, brought
an agreement from the Government to provide teachers
to accompany the state provided distance learning
materials. The parents had pointed out that they
worked all day and evenings during the travelling
season so could not act as tutors on a daily basis to
their children. As a result special teachers are sent
out periodically to support the larger shows and some
adults within the show community have been trained to
act as tutors on a daily basis in between
teachers’ visits. Wherever possible during the
longer stays the show children are enrolled into a
local school and are integrated into the social life
and community of the school. Thus the children enjoy
a full education and maintain their strong cultural
roots. This example of ‘parent power’
offers a model for further action.
The
power of parents should not be underestimated as in
most countries they are now perceived as clients and
often have a choice in schools and make a positive
contribution to schools, more that simple fund
raising. It is ironic then that EFECOT has not put
the empowerment of parents high on its list of
actions yet parental involvement is recognised as
necessary in ensuring success in learning.
The
Australian experience has demonstrated that even
where centralised organisations can provide quality
distance learning materials parents have demanded a
service which supports their learning as a group
rather than as isolated families: peer and adult
tutoring were innovations suggested by the parents.
The decision to opt for ‘local’ schools
wherever possible is evidence of their desire to be
part of ‘mainstream’, to belong and to be
included. This desire seems to permeate the
aspirations of the various Traveller groups in many
countries. Local authority education departments,
individual schools and school boards remain largely
ignorant of this and are unprepared to facilitate
these desires.
The
UK/EFECOT working group on Distance Learning
attempted to redress this situation through the
production of a video "Between Two Worlds",
a staff development pack entitled "What is Your
School Doing for Travellers?" and a booklet for
teachers on preparing quality distance learning packs
for children to take away with them. These have been
disseminated to each local authority in the UK yet
there is little follow up action to be seen.
The
Education Liaison Officers (ELOs) acting as mediators
between the show community and schools have been
effective in the UK at securing local recognition of
their case for a more appropriate education. Some
work closely with schools and their boards to
negotiate for support from the LEA. Glasgow City
Council has agreed to provide hand-held pupil records
for the show children to take with them during the
travelling season to use in the schools they visit.
Continuity and coherence should be more likely
together with less opportunity to be put at the back
of the class and left to get on with it on their own.
The STEP conferences asked for support from all local
authorities to make sure that schools understood the
need for these records to be completed. By the year
2000 we will know how effective this initiative has
been.
5.1
Interrupted Learning - The Role of School Boards
The
situation of travellers who lead a mobile life-style
offers a paradigm for the situation of many other
interrupted learners, pupils who have to spend some
time out of their school or who are forced through
home circumstances to enrol in many different
schools. Have their needs been brought to the
attention of School Boards? Do they consider them
when reviewing the school development and spending
plans? Do they accept and support these
children’s claim to an appropriate education?
There
will be some who are seen as ‘theirs’ and
who will enjoy more positive support as a result,
e.g. those with chronic and deteriorating illnesses.
Yet even they are allocated only a few hours of
teaching a week if they are fortunate to live in an
authority which provides home tuition. The teacher
sent to the child’s home is not their own
teacher but a stranger who does not know them or
their work habits and has often no direct contact
with the school. This approach can hardly be
described as ensuring continuity and coherence.
Others
who do belong to the school but are absent for
social/family reasons, such as ethnic minority pupils
on extended visits to their ‘home’ country
or young pregnant school girls, are not viewed so
sympathetically. Will the school board agree to meet
their needs? For the travellers who get moved
frequently and for the truants and drop-outs, who
monitors the relevance of the provision at the
school? What responsibility is taken for motivating
those who find learning in school difficult?
Are
school boards, even when willing, capable of taking
on such roles? Would it not be appropriate to give
them some grounding or training in how to represent
the whole school community, how to cope with the
challenges and stress than this entails? If they are
to perform a valuable and valued function for society
they too must be valued and given the tools to do the
job properly. They deserve no less as guardians of
our schools.
Dr
Elizabeth Jordan
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