Exclusions: What the Children Think

Abstract

Summary During the past few years there has been increasing concern about the number of pupils being excluded from school, the process of exclusion itself and the effects of exclusion upon the educational careers of young people. The over representation of pupils from the black and ethnic minority community in the population of excluded pupils has also been registered as a major area of concern. This paper aims to highlight some of the recent developments and key issues, to describe a small scale empirical study which examined the views of pupils excluded from school, and to propose some practical implications for future development. These include a booklet for students who have been excluded from school and an advice leaflet for parents. It is the underlying thesis of this paper that more studies are required to elicit the views of pupils themselves about the experience and effects of exclusion, perhaps utilising the sort of qualitative methodologies depicted in this paper, and furthermore, that pupils could and should play a more active role in the planning process than is currently the case.