Decolonising the curriculum in English secondary schools: Teacher-led initiatives in Bristol

Glowach, Terra; Hicks-Beresford, Tanisha; Mitchell, Rafael

Abstract

School teachers in England are in a problematic position with respect to the ‘decolonising the curriculum’ agenda. On the one hand, they have some scope to determine what they teach in terms of content and methods, and are not prohibited from engaging in such initiatives, as evidenced by the wide-ranging work underway (e.g. Moncrieffe 2020; Gandolfi 2021; Glowach 2019, 2022).

On the other hand, England has what we might term an ‘unconducive policy environment’ for this work. The Department for Education does not endorse such initiatives and external accountability measures do not incentivise them. Despite the government’s expressed aim to “eliminate discrimination [and] advance equality” in education (DfE 2014) ,its reforms to the national curriculum have been widely criticised for “nationalistic ideologies, with monocultural and Anglocentric emphases on exclusively British literature and propagandist history” (Cushing 2020, p429). National policy actors have little appetite to acknowledge or address well-documented curricular biases towards the perspectives and contributions of white men (e.g. Lais 2017; Parkin & MacKenzie 2017; Bain 2018; Belas & Hopkins 2019; Watson 2019; Moncrieffe 2020; Smith 2020; Tikly 2022).

• Online Publication Date: Jul 21, 2023
• Publication Date: Jul 21, 2023
• Deposit Date: Aug 2, 2022
• Publicly Available Date: Jul 22, 2025
• Book Title: Decolonising Education for Sustainable Futures
• ISBN: 9781529226089
• Keywords: Curriculum; secondary schools; Teacher-led initiatives; education, learning teaching; colonialism
• Public URL: https://uwe-repository.worktribe.com/output/9645208
• Publisher URL: https://bristoluniversitypress.co.uk/decolonizing-education-for-sustainable-futures
• Related Public URLs: https://www.tomlinsons-online.com/p-36887072-decolonizing-education-for-sustainable-futures.aspx