The Somali community in the UK: What we know and how we ... - ICAR

Table J: Achievement of Somali pupils in Camden schools
No. of pupils
% achieving 5+
A*-C
% achieving
1+ A*-G
Average number
of entries
Average
points score
Bangladeshi
139
28.1
95.7
8.6
32.8
Black African
118
26.6
89.0
8.0
29.5
Somali
32
3.1
81.3
7.0
17.4
Refugee
89
21.3
88.8
7.5
25.8
All pupils
1635
47.7
93.5
8.2
37.6
Source: Ali and Jones, 2000: 46
As might be expected, those Camden Somali
pupils who had been in school since year seven
did marginally better than the Somali cohort as a
whole. The same applies to the total school career.
The little evidence we have suggests that children
who are born in the UK and have therefore gone
through the British educational system have a
better chance of success than Somalis coming
into school from elsewhere. In Liverpool, the City
Council’s report on Somali young people found
that of their seven British-born respondents, three
had done well, three were still in education, and
only one was unemployed (1996: para. 4.4).
The real problem is to integrate children who
come into the system from Somalia at late primary
or secondary level, who have had a very different
system of education, probably disrupted by war, or
who have never been to school at all. The Somali
education system has been a major casualty of
political events. It was only in 1972 that Somali
orthography was devised, and the language put
into Latin script. This was part of Siad Barre’s early
period of reform - a successful national literacy
campaign was launched, and compulsory education
introduced. But mismanagement and shortage of
resources began the decline which the war was
to finish. In 1986 the literacy rate was still only
40%; half of primary age children were in school,
but only 7% of young people were in secondary
education. 91 By the end of the 1980s the whole
system had collapsed through the devastation of
armed conflict, and though some still struggled on
in the north, most schools were shut down.
This means that many Somali refugee children
arriving since the late 1980s may have had no
experience of formal schooling apart from
Arabic Koranic classes, which depend on rote
learning of the scriptures. Landing in inner city
comprehensives, they are lost. Many have been
deeply affected by their early experience of war,
they cannot speak English, have no understanding of
school culture, and no space to explain themselves.
In answer to one researcher’s questions about this
topic, Liverpool Somali respondents said:
Children are sitting around school
corridors as they cannot compete.
Some of those who have difficulty
in competing are wrongly assessed
as abnormal. The language barrier
and the trauma these children have
experienced requires specific attention
to cater for their needs.
Children are often in shock when they
come to Britain. They have travelled
from a war zone country and entered
Britain, a totally different environment
and culture. The majority of these
children came from rural areas.
Before they can recover from shock,
they are thrown into school. They are
often bullied because they come from
another country and cannot speak
English.
44 The Somali community in the UK