Best Practice

Responding to and dealing with racist incidents in school

Safeguarding Anti-Bullying Pastoral issues
How does your school ensure that racist incidents are met with a safeguarding response that protects the child and does not entrench racism? Orlene Badu advises
Image: Adobe Stock

Following the Child Q report published more than a year ago (Gamble & McCallum, 2022), many schools, settings and organisations are now clear that a key safeguarding responsibility for all children is to protect them from racism.

There is a growing number of voices calling for living with the experiences and consequences of racism to be classified as an adverse childhood experience (ACE). These experiences can and often do have lifelong consequences and can have a negative impact on the lives of children and adults alike.

In 2020, a study published by YMCA England and Wales found that 95% of young black people have heard and witnessed racist language at school (YMCA, 2020; see also Weale, 2020).

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