Don’t blame school exclusions for knife crime

For too many people, schools are the solution to every one of society’s problems. Last year my campaign group Parents & Teachers for Excellence – which campaigns to raise standards in state schools – logged 213 calls in the media for schools to teach something extra to address a perceived issue. When something is going wrong, we look to teachers to fix it.

Less common, but even more pernicious, is the phenomenon of blaming schools for causing societal problems in the first place. Now I accept that problems like illiteracy can be blamed on educators – we get paid lots of money to teach kids to read and write. But pinning the increase in knife crime and gang violence on schools excluding dangerous and disruptive kids (as we’ve seen from senior politicians this week)? I’m not having it.

Our school system is at a perilous point right now. After a long period where poor behaviour was brushed under the carpet or indulged, and qualifications dumbed down to hide the impact, recent years have seen Heads empowered to keep their schools safe, and exams toughened to better prepare kids for the future.