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One of the worst things that can happen to a child is dropping out of school early. Spanning essentially all countries around the world, “staying in school” is the fundamental mantra for thriving.
It is also the germ of truth at the heart of the UK’s growing movement to stop the use of exclusions or permanent removal from schools. Actors warn of a “pipeline” from exclusions to prisons, saying that the actions that lead to them are symptomatic of broader social failure. Their argument is reinforced by a series of studies showing the relationship between exclusion and committing violent crime.
As a result, the Labour Council, including my (and actually the Prime Minister’s) in Camden, has a manifesto commitment to reducing the number of exclusions to zero. But looking at the details in more detail, most of those commitments are paper-like. Politicians managed to drive away campaigners with their commitment to “a further exclusion.”
And the whole argument is more complicated than it first appears. It is certainly true that there is a link between exclusion and violence. Physical assault on students and staff is consistently one of the biggest reasons for elimination, and some form of violence is behind most cases when including the threat of violence, substance abuse and sexual assault. One reason why prisons have a “pipeline” is that most of the actions that lead to exclusion are already criminal.
One of the most recent academic research, defended by advocates of zero exclusion, offers a typical good case. The study compared 20,000 students who were evicted from school along with 20,000 who were disagreeable to ensure the same socioeconomic, ethnic and educational background. The 20,000 people asked to leave have found that others are twice as likely to continue committing serious violent crimes.
The conceit here is that one can draw a reasonable casual reasoning between a free school lunch and a comparison between those who are not, with one 14-year-old boy excluded. (The excluded modal students are 14 years old, male, and receive free school lunches.) But are they really surprised that teenagers who may have assaulted their fellow students or teachers, or who have threatened them, commit violent criminal offences? Very often, their first violent crime is the reason they are excluded in the first place.
That’s not to say that this study doesn’t teach us anything about value. It’s useful to know that about a quarter of prison goers will continue to attack again, as it tells you that rehabilitation is not working. It is also useful to know that the process of exclusion is not turning the lives of the children we expel. This should have something to do with us as excluded children progress into criminal adult careers, there are both individual costs and social costs. Instead, exclusions should be the beginning of your rehabilitation journey.
But this isn’t just for kids who are made to leave school. Exclusions are also valuable to students who are not forced to attend the same institution as teenagers who physically assaulted them (such behavior accounted for 939 of the 4,200 exclusions this fall). Or in 62 cases where people no longer need to be in the same place as those who were kicked out for sexual misconduct. It is valuable in 26 cases where a child has to go to school with someone racially abused. And it is worthy of teachers who no longer have to work with students who assaulted them or attacked another adult (770 cases).
This also illuminates the blind spots that all types of governments tend to have: dislike to confront the facts of violence. For example, refusing to accept decent gun control in the US has never taken into account the fact that you are always in the minority, mostly male minority, leaning towards violence. Neither has had a recent cheating between some of the left in America to “refund the police.”
Of course, it is true that some violent crimes may be prevented through measures other than exclusion, police or prison. The fact that the ethnic groups most likely to be excluded are people from Gypsy or Roman backgrounds, suggests that they are the best successful groups in the UK and that improving social policy outcomes play a key role. But in reality, violent offenders are often removed from where they committed those crimes in order to protect the victims.
Stephen.bush@ft.com
