IN a radical response to the problem of black boys under-performing at school, it has been suggested they be taught in separate classes from their white peers.
And the controversial proposal to help them do better at school has come from a race relations watchdog.
Trevor Phillips, chairman of the Commission for Racial Equality, said it was necessary to prepare for such a radical option because so many black boys are failing to get good GCSEs.
He also called for tougher action against black fathers, questioning whether they should be denied access to their sons if they refuse to attend school parents' evenings.
Figures published last month showed black teenagers continued to lag far behind their white classmates at GCSE, although there were signs the gap was narrowing.
'Not cool'
Last year, just over a third of black Caribbean pupils in England scored at least five C-grades at GCSE. The national average is 51.9 per cent.
Mr Phillips told BBC1's Inside Out programme that many black boys were suffering from a culture where it was not cool to be clever and they lacked good role models.
"If the only way to break through the wall of attitude that surrounds black boys is to teach them separately for some subjects, then we should be ready for that," he said. "And a tough new strategy would compel black fathers to be responsible fathers.
"If they can't be bothered to turn up for parents' evening, should they expect automatic access to their sons?"
He went on: "We need more male black teachers. I was one of the few lucky ones who escaped the fate of most black men of my generation.
"None of us, least of all the next generation of black children, can afford a repeat of the last 40 years."
Mr Phillips's comments follow a recent row over religious "segregation" in schools provoked by the head of Ofsted David Bell. Muslim groups reacted with anger when he warned that the growth of Islamic faith schools posed a potential threat to the "coherence" of British society.
What do you think of the segregation plans? Have your say.
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Boys and girls should be taught separately. I dont agree with mixed sex schools. The boys in my school were always a distraction. All the girls thought about was looking good to impress the boys. They were a topic of conversation in and out of the classroom. Instead of studying, they were sending notes round the classroom, who fancied who, and who was going out with who. Race didnt come into it, it was a distraction for most pupils having mixed classes.
What a very strange point of view, reintroducing segregation. Why would all black class rooms improve grades? Is there some radical form of teaching we haven't as yet been told about?
The CRE has done more to damage race relations in this country than any number of NF members. He is calling for segregation on grounds of colour - if I ( a white English citizen) suggested that my child was being held back by 'slow-learning blacks', Mr Philips would be knocking on my door PDQ, along with his mates in Blair's Thought Police. What hypocrisy!
I accuse the CRE of being racist.
If I had suggested white pupils should be segregated and taught in an all white environment the CRE would denounce me as a racist - and throw me to the wolves. How can they advocate this.
The reason this country has so many racial problems is because children are segregated and not taught together.
Remember Ray Honeyford who was the subject of a witch hunt many years ago for pointing out such segregation causes problems. He was proved right but the do-good lobby never apologised.
Now when it suits them they want segregation.
when you think about what the american blacks went through to fight segregation it makes me sick to hear this. if this had been suggested five years ago when PC was at it's insane height, there would have been mayhem. do black boys have different brains to white boys?? shall we segregate chinese, asians, irish, australians??? any black person that agrees with this is a total hypocrite.
I think David bell is out of his head and taking a safer option and not say the education has failed black students miserably. He knows its hard work to push the black puppets to start taking control and speaks up at the education institutions they work at.
I was one of the youth who failed and I'll tell you why I hated school and college. There was nothing to tell me about my identity, no black history for real! Nothing but stories on Adolph Hitler and Mussolini. The teachers bored the hell out of us and didn't make teaching exciting, and went further and pushed and prepared properly and engaged us. They just thought teaching was that, teaching on a board and "lets all read from a book."
Black history should be included in the curriculum. More activities relevant to the Black youths by using cultural content. Better pay for teachers or you're not going to get Black teachers. I am qualified but I am never gonna be a teacher cause its just doesn't pay well and too much dirty politics.
More work done to bridge the gap with parents instead of blaming them. You blame them and you going to get resentment. And an understanding, that many live in urban setting, and working hard to JUST SURVIVE and by understanding the struggles they face and work towards supporting parents instead of kicking them when they are down will help tremendously. But what he has done, is condemned the very people he needs help from!
He needs to realise his is also in a job and it maybe he is going to say something which will push people to kick him off his high and mighty and ignorant throne.
I've been saying it for years! Get Cultural content or Creative content in with the studies. Get the black youths to start their own newspaper and research Black history. Get monies and fund plenty of good, strong, mentors who THEY respect and love and it will work but David DOESN'T want answers. David Bell wants the easy way out and that is segregation? Is he nuts? There's enough divisions as it is and he's going to do that?
Man, he's got us all wrong. He's got us so damn wrong and he needs to wake up and start talking to the youths with respect and maybe spend some more time, and roll his sleeves up and get to know the youths. He may learn a thing two and one of them is checking how rubbish some of these teachers are!
There are good teachers out there but problem is, they are piled up with paper work and they need Black support and outreach works and PAY THEM WELL. I was one of them and got sick and tired of the rubbish pay for work I was doing and I made waves, postive outcomes but the education system in colleges suddenly seperate the workers when they succeed and I now don't trust the education system.
Bring in the Black dynamic student support and outreach workers! The students need more of them not ones who we now see as puppets. WE need ones that will speak out, and say what is really happening. That's what's gone wrong. The truth is not be said!
And talking about Muslim and how they should be more British. Oh man, he really got it wrong! He's going to lose his job soon cause he's got no damn idea!
It is very sad, and alarming, that the head of the body charged with promoting racial equality in the UK does not understand that separate is never equal. But then it is a truth that many of his colleagues in power at the moment don't seem to understand either. What does this stupidly racist, but also sexist idea suggest is going to happen when, as the government has decided, there is just one equality promotion body in the country? Will racial equality issues completely extinguish sexual equality ones? Here the head of the CRE has gone to the USA - where almost no progress has been made in desegregating schools - a country that is racist at every level to get his ideas. Others go to Jamaica, just aobut the most violent, sexist and prejudiced country in the world, where macho absolutely rules, for ideas on the same issue. What idiocity! How do these people propose defining "black boys" in the European country with the highest proportion and longest history of "cross-cultural" marriages? Woulkd it be too radical an idea to actually educate each pupil according to their need, regardless of colour, or sex? And when is someone going to actually dare to try to bring down the anti-education male cultures that have been diminshing males (and increasingly girls too) in this country, instead of pandering to it, and trying to profit from it, at the expense of everyone, not least those who waste their educational opportunities as a result?
The parents of the black boys are the only ones that should be held to account for the poor grades of there children and only them. Putting the blame on the schools is just nonsense. The parents should moniter there childs grades and progress while they are in school. But they do not they go to the pubs and sit there kids infront of the television. They should stay home and go over homework assignments with there children, and from just this simple task they would realize if there child needed some extra educational help to get them where they need to be at a certain grade level.
i belive segregation is racist, trevor philips and the CRE have whned for years about equality, now they have it in schools and society, they dont like that either. what the heck do they want?.
as for adam's comments, i hope he is not an english teacher as his grammar leaves a lot to be desired.
FACT: as there is very little black history in this country - how can you teach it?.
Mike Mape: how can you presume to comment on questions of education, when you don't even know how to spell "their"?
this is the most disgusting racist thing I have ever heard. I am so glad I moved here. This person needs to be fired. It's 2005 NOT 1955. I was a pupil at Greek Street Girls High in the 1960s. You, sir, are a disgrace to your country and to the British education system
When I lived abroad we had a similar system - that country was South Africa and the sytem was called apartheid.....
I stumbled upon your newspaper & article regarding segregation of black pupils. After reading your readers comments-several of them with reference to race relations & education in the US, I felt compelled to write. First, let me begin by saying while neither race relations nor education in the USA are anywhere near where they should be 200 years after slavery ended and more than 40 years after the Civil Rights Movement of the 1960's, life as even my grandmother knew it has so drastically changed because of desegregation. Any attempts in this country by the government (or any other powers-that-be) to return to a segregated society would be met with tremendous & majority opposition. Because of the intergration of public life in this country, because we socialize among one another at work, school, shopping we have learned/are still learning so much from one another which is what enables our growth and progress to continue. When like minds are put together all you will ever get is what you already have: like minds. But when minds with different backgrounds, ideas & ideals come together, work together, live together, play together the magnitude of cultural, political and social growth is limitless. I am a 36 year old black mother of one from what's called The South (a state in the southern region of the US) and cannot tell you how many days throughout my life I have spend daydreaming about and envying european life. You all are so blessed to life on a continent that is not secluded. On a moments notice you can be in England, France, Italy, Czech even into hundreds of countries in Africa-learning of other cultures, eating exotic foods, living with and meeting people 100% different from yourself in appearance. You are all so blessed to be in such close proximity to other cultures, yet we (most people in America) feel that you all take all of those things for granted. It is common AND EXPECTED that eastern citizens be fluent in several different languages; however, most Americans speak only English? Why? Because WE ARE ALL WE KNOW. Our country is an isolated country, so far removed from people who "aren't like us" that we (Americans) have earned the reputation worldwide of being, narrow-minded, arrogant & selfcentered. Unfortunately, in a lot of way we ARE simply because of the fact that WE ARE ALL WE KNOW. I feel in my heart that had we the benefit of being able to experience "the world" the way that europeans and easterners do we would be a country far more advanced than we are, yet the comments of your government official (concerning segregation) made me rethink my ideals about european cultural/racial diversity. My suggestion to your readers and to the government official considering segregating his students based on race (sex or any other attribute): DON'T!!! Embrace your students individuality, make learning exciting and new for your students. Remember that students who are not from your country have had to come to you from God knows what type of social, economic or political background. Develop programs to help them to assimilate into your school systems and societies that show them inclusion not seclusion. Remember that the parents of non-native students come from social and cultural backgrounds that may be different from your own, as well. Reach out to them without condemning them. Reach out to them over and over again if need be. I wish you all the best of luck and hope that your citizens will not allow any form of segregation to divide you.
to tia hinton:
the man from the campaign for racial equality (cre) trevor phillips who has made these remarks about segregation of black kids in school, is in fact black himself, not only that but a friend of tony blair (bush's only friend).
so how does that tie in with your comments?.
To: mhb, manchester
What difference dooes it make that the person suggesting segregation is is black. Narrow-mindedness knows no color.
Tia