The Kurdish Community in Islington Schools

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The Kurdish Community in Islington Schools
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The brief

• Can we collect and analyse language and ethnicity
  data in a way that gives us a more accurate
  picture of the Kurdish population in Islington
  schools?
• To what extent do our data underestimate the size
  of the Kurdish population?
• To what extent do the ethnicity categories we use
  match the way in which Kurdish people would like
  to describe themselves?
• What opinions do Islingtons Kurdish communities
  have about support for mother tongue maintenance?
  
• What should be the balance of our Kurdish and
  Turkish language support?
• What do we know about the different kinds of
  Kurdish spoken and written by Islingtons Kurdish
  community?
• Can we establish any relationship between Kurdish
  pupils sense of their own identity and
  educational outcomes?

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The research and the researcher

• Methodology
• analysis of ethnicity, language and performance
  data
• interviews with CEA_at_Islington staff (Advisory
  Teacher for Refugee Pupils, Advisory Teacher for
  Mother Tongue Supplementary Schools, Bilingual
  Community Workers and any other relevant staff)
• visits to community organisations
• visits to schools
• Reseacher
• Hasan Sahan, Community Training Solutions

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Language and ethnicity data
Source PLASC 2003 and Language Census 2003
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Before and after speaking to parents in five
schools
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Does inaccuracy in ethnic categorisation matter?
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Key recommendations

• Recognise the distinctiveness of the Kurdish
  community
• Provide training to improve accuracy of ethnicity
  records
• Engage with Kurdish community organisations
• Employ more Kurdish speaking staff
• Tackle the term Turkish speaking