Pearson Schools Blog

The education sector is predominantly made up of white people. White teachers and senior leaders, in fact only 3% of headteachers in the country are black. The lack of diversity in education however spreads much further than the school walls: the majority of those working for exam boards, publishers, illustrators, even DfE Ministers and management are white. In addition to the work that needs to be done to bring more diverse people into these groups, , there are many organisations within education who can and should at least be ethical leaders in what they produce.

Dr Anne-Marie Imafidon MBE shares her thoughts on the crossover between gender and maths anxiety and the impact on wider society, as part of Pearson’s Power of Maths Spotlight series.

At Pearson we are committed to equity and opportunity for all learners. We strive to create educational content and learning environments that reflect the diversity of the modern world, are accessible and help all learners achieve without limits. As part of our work in Music qualifications, we are talking to musicians and industry partners to understand the implications of diversity, equity, and inclusion across different genres and practices within this creative subject to inform future development across these qualifications. To learn more about the importance of DE&I in Folk Music, Pearson interviewed professional folk musician and author of the teaching resource Black Singers and Folk Ballads, Cohen Braithwaite-Kilcoyne and the Education Director at the English Folk Dance and Song Society, Rachel Elliott.

Knee-jerk: “a quick reaction that does not allow you time to consider something carefully”

When a topic or issue becomes very present in the public eye (often despite having always been of paramount importance, as is the case with genuine diversity and inclusion in education) or it begins to feel more urgent, there can be pressure to actively resist or even just to react.

Deborah Maclaren, MD of LoveReading4Kids, explores why it is crucial that diverse and inclusive books are normal for every pupils, not niche.

It is unusual for challenge to be at the heart of a teacher’s reading experience, but for school library staff, this is the routine state of play. School library staff aim to build a collection to support learning and personal development; with resources not entering by ‘default’. Instead, each item has to justify its place as part of the library collection.

Writing a piece exploring the opportunities inclusivity offers seemed like a pretty straightforward task. Find some stats, look at some research, read up on a few ‘experts’ and write an article littered with percentages and data…easy! 

That is what Inclusivity has now become after all - a series of research, a plethora of experts and survey after survey churning out a load of stats, repeating the message over and over again that “We need more Diverse books”. 

Whether it’s teacher-tutor or pupil-tutor, there is a myth that due to technology and communicating through a screen, solid relationships can’t be built but as tutors, teachers and pupils will testify, this definitely isn’t the case. 

If you imagine an engineer – or, better still, do a Google image search – virtually every picture features a hard hat, overalls, hi-vis and men. Almost exclusively men.

Do the same with designers, and there are sewing machines, fabrics, colour swatches and women.