This resource from the Child Poverty Action Group provides teacher trainees with an opportunity to review the relationship between poverty and education and to consider what more might be done within schools to disrupt an intergenerational cycle of disadvantage.
The Child Poverty Action Group aims to improve understanding of the causes and impact of poverty in the United Kingdom. Improving the outcomes experienced by the poorest children has also been a strong focus in much of recent education policy. However, in this briefing document it is argued that there remains a great deal more to be done. The complex relationship between educational failure and socio-economic disadvantage is discussed and key points are outlined under two headings:
1. Exclusion from the system
2. Exclusion within the system
Issues discussed include:
- The tendency for schools to be segregated along socio-economic lines
- The difficulty of ensuring that additional resources reach the children and families that need them most
- The relationship between poverty, truancy and disciplinary exclusion
- The more limited take up of education and training opportunities by pupils from the poorest backgrounds and the impact of this on future employment
- Barriers to participation created by additional costs within schools, particularly but not exclusively in relation to extra-curricular activities
- Access to nutrition within schools
The briefing concludes with a number of recommendations, including that:
Child poverty in the UK is placed on the curriculum for all teacher training courses (p. 4)
Louise Gazeley
Keywords
social class, exclusion, disadvantage, poverty
Article Id :
14967
Date Posted:
9/1/2009