Looked-after children have consistently highlighted how welfare practitioners (teachers, social workers and carers) hold ‘low expectations’ about their educational potential (Elliott, 2002; SEU, 2003; Jackson, 2010a; Berridge, 2012; Mannay, Staples, Hallett, Roberts, Rees, Evans and Andrews, 2015). Jackson (2010) argues that there needs to be a far more positive culture towards the expectations others have of looked-after children. In terms of their time in school, Elliott (2002) discovered that teachers expected looked-after children not to be able to meet homework deadlines and that they were victims of bullying, more often than their non-looked-after peers.
Research by the Institute of Education (2015) revealed how teachers perceived students from poorer disadvantaged backgrounds or those with a Statement of Special Educational Needs (SEN) as less able when compared to their peers (Adams, 2015). For a child or young person issued with a SEN, this indicates, crudely, that they have learning challenges which require special educational provision (Welsh Government, 2015b). Thomas (2005, p. 183) suggests this factor alone: ‘would lead one to expect that the average level of achievement of looked after children would be lower than that of the general population’. Fletcher-Campbell and Archer (2003) observed that one-third of the looked-after young people in their study were statemented and that this in some way became self-fulfilling in anticipating failure during their Key Stage Four assessments. In 2015, of the 3,400 children in need who were looked-after, 1,265 children had no special educational needs while 640 children (19 per cent) had a SEN (Welsh Government, 2016a). Compared to 3 per cent for pupils in Wales (for all ages), the average proportion of children in need with a SEN was 27 per cent (for all ages) (Welsh Government, 2016a, p. 2).
Being looked-after, however, does not automatically imply the need for special education (Berridge, 2012). The Wales Audit Office (2012, p. 19) notes that: ‘the low achievement of looked after children is not accounted for by the relatively high proportion who have additional learning needs.’ Jackson and McParlin
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(2006) argue that having a SEN is likely to be understood by teachers and social workers as implying low intelligence. Prior to the 1980s, children termed as having ‘special learning needs’ were labelled as ‘educationally sub-normal’ (ESN) pupils and educated outside mainstream schools (James and James, 2004). Specifically, it was the Warnock Report (1978) that argued that categorising and excluding these children was more likely to result in stigma and failure than achievement and success. Thus there was a change from classifying children as ESN to the less pejorative SEN label (James and James, 2004). Jackson and Sachdev (2001) discovered that many looked-after children felt their potential was undermined by school staff. In a longitudinal study, Davey (2006, p. 266) described that in one authority in south Wales, there was some evidence that key practitioners ‘tended to take a rather pessimistic view of the education potential of the young people and did not vigorously promote their inclusion or achievement.’ As some have described, teachers can be mentioned as the most common source of academic support however, a minority of young people explain that teachers have a lack of understanding of their looked-after status and feel that they had been stereotyped as low achievers (Harker, Dobel- Ober, Akhurst, Berridge and Sinclair, 2004).
In a different study (Dixon, Wade, Byford, Weatherly and Lee, 2006) the views of 106 young people across seven local authorities in England were explored prior to them leaving care. Dixon and colleagues (2006, p.80) discovered that 54 per cent had left school with: ‘no qualifications at all.’ Regarding the leaving care practitioner input: ‘the motivation for encouraging participation was not always aimed at attainment per se’ (Dixon et al., 2006, p. 87). Numerous young people: ‘were often undertaking fairly low-level courses that may not necessarily push them up the career ladder’ (Dixon et al., 2006, p. 87). For many looked-after children in compulsory education, being in care is associated with lower GCSE grades, for example, ‘G’ and ‘F’ grades (Berridge, 2012). It is unknown whether this:
is linked to the specific reasons for being in care which are not accounted for in the family background and parenting factors, such as neglect or abuse; or they might be attributable to particular ways in which care services operate (Berridge, 2012, p. 1174).
By stark contrast, Monbiot (2015) writhing in the Guardian (online), has suggested that elites, in their cause of self-advancement, engender aspirational
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parents who condemn ‘their children to a desperate, joyless life’ of status seeking and ladder-climbing. He cites one example where parents: ‘had already decided that their six-month-old son would go to Cambridge then Deutsche Bank.’
In another account of aspirational parents, their two-year-old daughter already: …had a tutor for two afternoons a week (to keep on
top of maths and literacy) as well as weekly phonics and reading classes, drama, piano, beginner French and swimming. They were considering adding Mandarin and Spanish (Monbiot, 2015).
Regarding middle-class parents, it is argued that they are more likely to relate to the school system as it is a key source of mobility and cultural capital (Laureau, 1987). Moreover, it is recognised that middle-class parents take an active role in their child’s education (Smith, 2007; Jackson, 2010a; Berridge, 2012; Ball, 2013). Berridge (2012, p.1175) has argued that: ‘the State should have positive expectations for the children it looks after in the same way that middle class families do’. He describes how middle class families (through house purchases and moves) usually plan their lives around their children's education and argues: ‘the State should give the same priority to the education of children in care’ (Berridge, 2012, p. 1174). In contrast, instead of accepting elite, upper and middle class norms which problematise the working classes, Reay (2001) suggests it would be more productive to problematise conceptions of restless social mobility and an associated meritocracy; which are after all middle-class practices. This may be more difficult to problematise however, as the British education system, despite more than 100 years of universal state education, continues to serve middle-class interests: ‘which valorizes middle - rather than working-class cultural capital’ (Reay, 2001, p. 334). Unlike their upper and middle class counterparts, many working class looked-after children and young people experience a lack of continuity and many receive very little support from their families (Sinclair, 1998). Moreover, and to reiterate an earlier point: ‘their social workers are pressed for time; there is a rapid turnover in care staff - all this means there is no-one to take a broad interest in their schooling’ (Sinclair, 1998, p. 10). Harker, Dobel-Ober, Lawrence, Berridge and Sinclair (2003) revealed an absence of significant pro-education relationships amongst looked- after children and adults in their study. As stated by Jackson and Martin (1998), the protective factors essential for later educational success are: stability and continuity; having a parent or carer who values education; having friends outside
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of care who did well at school; developing hobbies; consistent encouragement and support and from adults and attending school regularly. In addition, looked- after children and young people:
…should have the same opportunities as other children to education, including further education. They should also be offered other opportunities for development, such as leisure and extracurricular activities (Jackson and Sachdev, 2001, p. 1).