The Student Voice focus for 2020/21 was Anti-Racism. During the Autumn term we held a conference for staff and students, through-out the spring term our students made short films inspired by their experiences and in the summer term schools used the films and accompanying lesson plans to facilitate Anti-Racism conversations in their classrooms.
The project was a collective response to the black lives matters movement, and went alongside the Anti-Racism work taking place across all our individual schools.
Our students have chosen Mental Health as the focus for 2021/22.
Our project aims:
- To create a safe space where all our students and teachers can talk about race and how we can promote anti-racism across our schools,
- To articulate a shared language for talking about race within and beyond our community,
- To develop cultural understanding in order to eliminate unconscious bias and micro aggressions,
- To support all students in their journey towards developing the confidence and courage needed to challenge racism in order to promote racial justice and racial equality,
- To equip and train staff to tackle racism and build a united anti-racist school.
This project is predominantly funded by a DfE Partnership grant.
Diversity within the SSLP
In the 2020 Autumn Term we asked the SSLP Community what languages they spoke. Sixty percent of people only speak English home – but 40% speak one or more languages – some as many as four!
Summer Term
Film Screening & Year 8 Lessons
On Thursday 27th May we held a film screening at Theatre Peckham where students shared their films and heard from some guest speakers.
Each SSLP school will now commit to using one or more of the films and lesson plans in their own school before the end of the academic year. All the resources can be found by following the link below.
Spring Term Project
Supported by their teachers and an external expert, students who attended the Autumn Conference and their interested peers worked in multi-school groups to collaboratively produce short videos that encourage conversations about racism.
The four short films have been made by students in Years 9, 10 and 12, in response to their own experiences of racism. The students have also designed lesson plans to accompany the films so that they can be used in our schools. The students have been working together since January 2021. Due to coronavirus restrictions they have not been able to meet their peers in different year groups or from different schools, so all meetings have taken lace via Zoom. It has not been an easy process of collaboration during a national lockdown so we are particularly proud of their achievements.
Autumn Term Anti – Racism Conference
The first of two planned virtual conferences took place on Wednesday 25th November 2020. The conference came about following a collaboration between several SSLP schools, and was led by St Saviour’s & St Olave’s (SSSO).
We invited each school to register six students from years 9, 10 and 12 and up to three members of staff.
During this event over 100 staff and students from fourteen SSLP schools came together virtually to learn, discuss and share their commitment. This is now being cascaded into each individual school.
The first conference included:
– a key note speech as a call to action, reiterating our statement of intent
– a panel discussion on race and education
– staff and student discussions in separate break out groups
Michelle Ferguson, Deputy Headteacher at SSSO, welcomed everyone to the conference and gave an introduction to the aims of the day.
The focus for teachers was training and how to support their students. The focus for students was exploring how they can lead change through a collaborative SSLP student led project.
“Thank you so much for hosting a truly inspirational and influential conference. It was a pleasure and privilege to finally address and tackle racism at schools!”
Dulwich College, student
Nithya Murugan, Head of Academic Enrichment at Queen’s College London, then introduced the inspiration keynote speaker Ndu Uchea, himself an alumni of Dulwich College. Ndu spoke about the power of youth voice and the use of film/video for highlighting the need for change. His first video to go viral was the excellent What I Wasn’t Taught in School.
Our Keynote Speaker was Ndubuisi Uchea
Ndubuisi Uchea is the co-founder and Head of Partnerships of Word on the Curb, an insight and creative agency devoted to connecting organisations with underrepresented audiences. Having set up the business in 2013 whilst studying at the University of Manchester, Word on the Curb started producing some of the most watched youth-led content across social media, growing their Youtube channel whilst working with the likes of the NHS, Nando’s and Unilever connecting them with marginalised communities across the UK
At this point staff and students followed a separate programmes. The students were facilitated by Nicola Ponsford from the GEC. Their programme explored what racism is and how it can be addressed, as well as how race is represented in mainstream media. It was part funded by the #IWill programme.
[The conference] changed my view of racism in films and the media.
Student attendee
I enjoyed the opportunity to talk to others on such a delicate matter.
Student attendee
Discussion Panel – for staff
Before splitting into smaller groups staff listened to a Panel Discussion facilitated by Michelle Ferguson, SSSO.
The panellists were:
- William ‘Lez’ Henry, professor of sociology and criminology
- Ankhara Lloyd, executive coach and teacher
- Carol Murraine, head of programmes at Eastside Young Leaders Academy
Each member of the panel began with a short introduction of themselves highlighting the work they have done around race. The panellists then had 4 minutes each to present their response to each of the key questions.
The key questions:
- What is racism and why do we need to act now?
- What are the barriers to achieving racial equality and racial justice? How do we remove these barriers?
The remaining 15 mins were a Q and A activity with participants posing questions. At the end the panellists had 1 min to present a closing summary.
The breakouts I was involved with were useful in providing actions going forward, specifically a framework for the use of consistent language.
Staff attendee
The break out discussion groups were very interesting and being able to hear from the panel guests was invaluable as well as sharing ideas and hearing them from other schools.
Staff attendee
This conference aims to be the start of our conversation about race and we have set a media project for all participating schools. Working in multi-school clusters, students with the support of their teachers, will make a film about race. The film will be aimed at Year 8 students and will be accompanied by a PSHE lesson plan. The films will be produced across the Spring term with the support of experienced broadcaster Laurence Lee and we will showcase them in early summer.
To access recordings of some of the presenters please email k.barretta@sslp.education
Hate Crime in the UK
In October 2020, the Home Office published provisional trends in racially or religiously aggravated offences under Covid-19 restrictions in England and Wales, up until July 2020. In June offences were up by one third compared to 2019.
In December 2020 the House of Commons published their latest Hate Crime Statistics for the year ending 31st March. There were 105,090 hate crimes recorded, 72% of them were racially aggravated. The 76,070 offences recorded are a 6% increase on 2019. Twenty percent of these offences were violent and a further 5% involved criminal damage.
Figures show that the Metropolitan police area is the second highest in the country for racially aggravated crime with 198 reports per 100,000 population, and is the highest area for religion with 25 per 100,000.