Frances Gallannaugh

Inclusion and achievement in mainstream schools

This paper considers the key findings of a DfES‐funded study that explored the relationship between achievement and inclusion in mainstream schools in England. The methodology involved a statistical analysis of nationally held data on all pupils at the end of key stages 1–4, together with a series of site visits to ‘inclusive’ mainstream schools. These were carried out in order to explore school processes that might explain how some schools can manage to be both highly achieving and inclusive. Findings indicate that there is a small, but for all practical purposes, insubstantial relationship between inclusion and academic achievement at the school level although there is also a large degree of variation suggesting strongly there are other factors within a schools make up, rather than its degree of inclusivity, that impact on the average academic achievements of its pupils. This was confirmed from the analysis of the school site visits. The overall conclusion, therefore, is that mainstream schools need not be concerned about the potentially negative impact on the overall academic achievements of their pupils of including pupils with SEN in their schools.

Disproportionality in Special Needs Education in England

Unlike the United States, England does not have a special education system based on the identification of students as having disabilities of one or another type. Instead, the English system enables help to be provided to students on the basis of assessments of their individual “special educational needs.” The authors consider the implications of this position for the disproportional presence of students from different social groups in the special needs system. They argue that disproportionality is a reality in England, as in the United States, though it cannot be understood simply in relation to racial minorities. Nor, within a non-disability-based system, does it arise principally from the misidentification of students as having disabilities. Instead, it reflects broad educational and social inequalities. Disproportionality research, therefore, needs to concern itself with these inequalities.

The relationship between inclusion and academic achievement in English mainstream schools

This article presents the key findings and discusses the implications of a major study that explored the relationship between academic achievement and the inclusion of pupils with special educational needs (SEN) in mainstream schools in England. It is based on a statistical analysis of nationally held data on all pupils in England that is collected at the end of each of the 4 key stages, when pupils are aged 7, 11, 14, and 16. The analysis considered the relationship between academic achievement and inclusivity having controlled for a range of other variables. Findings indicate that there is no relationship between academic achievement and inclusion at the local authority (LA) level while there is a small but, for all practical purposes, insubstantial relationship at the school level. In addition, there is also a large degree of variation at the school level, suggesting strongly that there are other factors within a schools make up, rather than its degree of inclusivity, that impact on the average academic achievements of its pupils. The overall conclusion, therefore, is that mainstream schools need not be concerned about the potentially negative impact on the overall academic achievements of their pupils of including pupils with SEN in their schools.

The teaching and learning of pupils in low-attainment sets

This study explored the ways in which schools addressed the needs of pupils in low-attainment class groups, or sets, in the context of multiple and contrary government policy directives and inconclusive research findings about setting. In this article we have focused on school and classroom practices as well as the organisational processes through which low-attaining pupils were identified, grouped and reviewed within schools. The empirical data reported here predominantly refer to case studies involving classroom observations and interviews with teachers, pupils and other staff in 13 schools – both primary and secondary – from four local authorities (LAs). In the latter part of the article, however, we also draw on survey data collected from a larger sample of schools in 12 LAs in England. Although the study found ample evidence of innovative school practices and efforts by individual teachers aimed at optimising the learning opportunities for children in low-attainment class groups, the findings also raise important questions about some of the processes of set allocation, the lack of mobility between sets, and the over-representation of particular social groups in low-attainment classes. We conclude with a discussion of the implications for equity and inclusion that moves beyond an emphasis on classroom practice to include questions about the in-school processes of social selection and educational mobility for pupils identified as low-attaining.

Conceptualising school-community relations in disadvantaged neighbourhoods: mapping the literature

Abstract Background: The field of school–community relations is well established in the scholarly literature. However, its largely descriptive and fragmented nature has served to disguise its conceptual complexity. To date, the sets of assumptions about school–community relations which underpin the literature, and the opportunities, tensions and limitations inherent in these, have tended to remain implicit. Consequently, while stronger school–community relations have typically been seen as desirable – and especially so as a mechanism for tackling neighbourhood disadvantage – the more contentious issues of what, precisely, they should be seeking to achieve, how and whose values they should promote, have far less often been discussed. This paper foregrounds these issues. Purpose: A conceptual map of the scholarly literature on school–community relations is developed, surfacing the sets of understandings embedded in the field by academic authors. The map is intended to act as a heuristic tool, helping readers to navigate and critique the field and to identify gaps in the literature which must now be addressed. Design and methods: A review was undertaken of the subset of the school–community literature concerned with the role of schools in relation to geographically located communities experiencing economic and associated forms of disadvantage. The scholarly literature published in English since 1990 was searched, using strings of search terms representing ‘school’ + ‘community’ + ‘disadvantage’. A process of conceptual synthesis was used to surface the understandings embedded in the literature, with 60 texts being read and summarised in detail by a minimum of two reviewers. Two external advisory groups of academic experts (a UK-based cross-disciplinary group, and an international group of education specialists) supported the review process by identifying relevant literatures in their specialist fields and national contexts, and by challenging and elaborating the reviewers’ emerging interpretations of understandings embedded in the literature. Findings and conclusions: The field is dominated by texts which take for granted the leading role of professionals (for instance, teachers, principals, public service officers and policy-makers) acting on agendas determined outside communities, and which have a tendency to cast communities in the largely passive role of responding to school-initiated interventions. A smaller subset of literature focuses on community-initiated actions and most often reports examples of parents developing programmes to support students’ learning. While these offer important critiques of professional, deficit-driven conceptualisations of communities, they still tend to locate communities as supporting professional agendas rather than as having opportunities to shape these from a community standpoint. The field is also dominated by accounts of ameliorative actions taken to alleviate the acute symptoms of underlying disadvantage and there are very few accounts of actions seeking to transform local circumstances by tackling underlying inequalities. This weighting may reflect the opportunities for action most readily available to schools and communities wishing to tackle neighbourhood disadvantage. The most productive avenues for future research may therefore lie in exploring how possibilities for ameliorative action can be strengthened and can bring together professional and community perspectives.