C HR ISTOPHER H E ATHCOTE How the ABC Teaches Kids Racism M y younger brother had to change schools due to racism. As the only boy from an English-speaking background in a large class, he was targeted by some of the boys for a hard time. It wasn’t only his freckle-faced, auburnhaired difference. He was keen, scoring top marks in each subject, so those classmates set to taunting his performance. They did this openly, calling him spiteful names in class. What his teachers then did beggared belief. They saw my brother as a problem because he was so far in front academically; besides, disruptive behaviour from some multicultural youngsters broke out whenever he participated in class discussion. So the teachers began excluding him from classes. By his second year at high school in suburban Melbourne he was exiled to the library for hours each day— to all intents, the teaching staff had joined in the abuse. My memories of that episode returned in September when ABC television screened The School That Tried to End Racism. Hosted by Marc Fennell of SBS’s Mastermind quiz, this locally-produced three-part documentary followed a group of Year 6 pupils at an unidentified government school in Sydney. The children participated in a trial project intended to raise their racial awareness and to prevent prejudice. It was designed and supervised by Professor Fiona White, a social psychologist at the University of Sydney, and delivered by three of the primary school’s teachers led by Hayley Campbell, an assistant principal. T he ABC ran quite a beat-up, saturating its advertising breaks with promotional clips. It promised absorbing television, being based on a show run in 2020 on Britain’s Channel 4 which followed a trial project at a secondary school in London. Halting the spread of racism is a pressing issue, and the public doesn’t hear how this is tackled via the classroom. However, it was evident once 20 the documentary was screened that neither Marc Fennell nor his scriptwriters are teachers. They were unfamiliar with the overarching curriculum, and seemingly ignorant even of acceptable teaching practice. Like the efforts to make Caucasian pupils feel guilty for being white. You don’t do that to children. Then there were activities which disconcerted the impressionable nine-to-eleven-year-olds, upsetting all, and reducing some to tears. Any professional educator—indeed, any sensible person—would worry about emotional harm. One confronting presentation shook the teachers and had the assistant principal weeping. Oblivious to the unsettled youngsters, Professor White was fixated with social engineering. Her enthusiastic talk smacked of A Clockwork Orange, as she explained throughout how she was programming these children with correct ideas. Whether this may be psychologically damaging to children, let alone whether it was forced indoctrination, not responsible education, did not seem to cross White’s mind: although these are questions British educators, parents and journalists debated over the trial program there. F irst came tests said to measure existing racial attitudes. In the British documentary, selected images of coloured and white faces had been displayed and pupils told to describe them. Teachers at the London secondary school assessed whether words used were positive or negative, then ranked pupils on their “racial bias”. This and other purported checks drove one sensitive thirteen-year-old to flee the class crying. Viewers swamped Channel 4’s switchboard with calls over the incident. The ABC did not use these same tests. The younger Australian children had to nominate their close friends then complete a questionnaire with multiple-choice answers. Their friends were checked for ethnic diversity, although the questionnaire’s content was not detailed. After results were Quadrant December 2021 How the ABC Teaches Kids Racism checked it was declared that most children exhib- their parents speak English at home? Take another ited “racial bias”. Prejudice percentage levels were step forward. Were they the same skin colour as charted across the primary school class, and pupils the Prime Minister? And so it went before the race individually scored on latent racism. This would be could begin. Those stuck at the back line were getrepeated at the end of the last program, with some ting agitated as questions mounted. Then an adult children shown their “improved” scores on racial explained that this demonstrates “White Privilege”, bias, much like marks for maths or spelling. which is how the world runs: in their future lives the Next step was to put pupils in “affinity groups”. Caucasian pupils will have a big head start, whereas This is jargon for running the class like a counsel- others can expect to be handicapped no matter the ling session for adults with behavioural problems. effort they make. Dismayed, the pupils all proProfessor White explained it enabled children to claimed this unfair, with the Caucasians expressing speak freely among their racial peers. Caucasian shame and regret for their racial membership. pupils were segregated, and the rest gathered in The Sydney teachers were delighted at this reaca multi-ethnic Otherness group. A white teacher tion, especially the white pupils being upset. Again then asked the Caucasian group, “How do you feel the children watched obvious signs of adult approval. about being white?”, while an ethnic-background One youngster then grumbled, “White people have teacher asked the Others how they more rights”, and another stated felt about “not being white”. only white people sit in Australia’s The older British pupils had parliament. Instead of correcting he teacher then cottoned on to what was happenchanged the query, them, the teachers agreed! ing here, although the younger asking, “Do some of he School that Tried to End Australian children were baff led Racism is a lesson in the hazby the questions. You could see you feel uncomfortable ards of pressing on children mateconfusion on little faces. So they were silent. They were asked again. being white?” This is rial they are not developmentally One Caucasian child shyly said a leading question. ready to handle. Educational psywas ignored. Guidelines she didn’t understand. The Sydney It begs affirmation. chology which underpin education in this teacher then changed the query, When a girl very country, and are drummed into asking, “Do some of you feel uncomfortable being white?” This is a leadhesitantly said yes, every trainee teacher in their unistudies, were broken quite ing question. It begs affirmation. the teacher responded versity recklessly. When a girl very hesitantly said yes, positively. There are important reasons why the teacher responded positively. Western countries order schooling Looking to teacher for approval, into primary and secondary levels. others joined in and said they felt uncomfortable too, tentatively suggesting emotions. They are linked with cognitive and psychological The teacher not only praised those who expressed development, “children” being different mentally shame at “being white”, but reported to Professor and behaviourally from “adolescents”. It isn’t that teenagers have hormones kicking in: they conWhite that they had higher levels of “insight”. This segment in the ABC’s documentary made ceptualise in a sophisticated, increasingly complex for astonishing television. It showed how an adult manner. Personal identity is largely shaped during can manoeuvre vulnerable children into giving a adolescence; pre-teens do not yet possess a firm desired answer. What the teacher did on camera sense of self. Education is structured sequentially to is termed the “observer effect” in anthropology and assist these changes to equip youngsters with necespsychology, the researcher compromising their own sary skills and aid their psychosocial development. In Britain the anti-racism project was trialled observations through negligent procedure with human subjects. Thank goodness those young ones at a secondary school, whereas Australia used a weren’t being asked if their parents touched them primary school. This led to a participant age difinappropriately. They could have been tricked into ference of at least eighteen months. The conceptual level of the Sydney children was evident when they saying yes. Both the Channel 4 and ABC documentaries struggled with questions about identity. Watching next moved to a sports ground, with pupils advised them on television, one saw what is described they were to race each other. All stood on the at length in educational psychology textbooks. starting line and were told to move to other lines Lacking the maturity needed, many children did if they answered yes to given questions. Did they not understand, indeed, they could not yet concephave blue or green eyes? Step forward if yes. Did tualise that way. T T Quadrant December 2021 21 How the ABC Teaches Kids Racism When the Sydney children were asked how they felt about either being white, or not being white, they did not initially answer because they were too young to comprehend the question. Identity in the sense intended by their adult teachers was conceptually alien to them. When answers were offered, the children were visibly trying to please teacher, following her observable responses so as to say what she seemed to want to hear. Their incomprehension was confirmed later by an activity where adults of different races stood before the class, and pupils had to pick from a list each person’s occupation. The children ignored race and went on what clothing the adults wore. When careers were revealed, pupils pointed out where clothing didn’t meet dress conventions. Most telling was when the class visited a room with a map of the world on the floor. The children were told to stand on the country they considered “home”. Few chose Australia, most standing on other lands. The teachers were taken aback, quizzing children on their answers. Repeatedly Australianborn children nominated another country as “home”. The Sydney teachers did not know what to make of this, and how the youngsters were giving their parents’ place of origin. It looked very much that the children still lacked a sufficiently evolved personal identity, and therefore took the question to mean “Where does your family come from?” If the question about home were put to adolescents a few years older, and thereby with a maturing sense of self, the answers would have been very different. W hy didn’t the organisers bring in a specialist from an education faculty at one of Australia’s universities? This country has an abundance of academics expert in primary and secondary school education, including internationally ranked authorities in educational psychology. Professor Fiona White, who supervised the project throughout, is from another field. As the head of Sydney University’s Psychology of Intergroup Relations unit, she is well published and what she has written on racial and gender bias is firm; but her work is mostly with adults. She is the social psychologist to consult if an organisation needs to address prejudice or group tensions, remedying detrimental attitudes among adults in a workplace, a community service provider, a sports setting, or a social club. Professor White’s points about diversity and inclusion are familiar terrain to executives who have completed professional management courses. But educational psychology is very different territory. Every parent will spot the elementary flaw in Professor White’s theories when her first test misin22 terprets pupils’ friendships. If left up to themselves, children form friends according to temperament and common interests. The ethnicity of those friends is not an indicator of latent bias. Often youngsters are unaware of race, and do not perceive close friends as being different from themselves. Likewise most parents will disregard race, being pleased simply if their children find friends with a pleasant nature while avoiding rough or naughty children. (Awareness of ethnicity will usually come into play with adolescence, as individuals develop a sense of their own and others’ personal identities.) Besides misattributing race to childhood friendships, the project uses improper questionnaires. A multiple-choice format is unreliable for children because those unable to comprehend will tick random boxes, giving a false result. Many secondary schools have pupils entering from primary level complete questionnaires to check their learning. Each question requires a single word or short statement as written response. This ensures the child grasps the question: those unable to do so give an inappropriate response or leave the space blank. As for the ABC’s show, it was apparent from subsequent talk in the Affinity Groups that many children did not fathom what they were quizzed about. Affinity Groups are employed for counselling adults, often within an organisation. A moderator enables participants to discuss problem behaviour, such as bullying or harassment. In working through this, one or more individuals eventually admit to wrongdoing and accept feelings of shame. In keeping with this method, the Caucasian pupils were coerced into expressing shame for being white, and also guilt at what white people have collectively done to other races. Teachers mustn’t do this with young children—educational psychology vetos it. The core text used in most Australian teaching degrees, Educational Psychology for Learning and Teaching by Duchesne, McMaugh, Bochner & Krause, stresses how children from seven to twelve years of age should be acquiring basic skills and the social tools to participate in society. “The dominant task for children at this stage,” it explains, “is to appreciate the value of industry and productive activities while avoiding an excessive sense of inferiority.” Potential sources for feelings of inferiority that teachers must counteract include “racism, sexism and other forms of discrimination. If children believe that success is related to ‘who you are’ rather than to how hard you try, they will begin to think ‘Why try?’.” Professor White’s program disregards this cardinal rule, as was apparent with a class treasure hunt. Afterwards the four prize-winners faced the rest as Marc Fennell told the class how unfair this was. Alluding to White Privilege, he Quadrant December 2021 How the ABC Teaches Kids Racism pointed out that all had made the “same effort” yet in The School That Tried to End Racism, such as those only a few got prizes. categories said to shape privilege. Teenagers in the Worse came when two indigenous men, both upper years of school would point out that social members of the “stolen generation”, addressed the privilege is connected with family wealth, attendclass. One had a wrenching performance rehearsed. ing a private school, having parents who are profesHe displayed a doll’s house with wooden kokeshi- sionals, and so on, not the colour of your eyes. like dolls inside, then, speaking with a strong voice, Some classes in Professor White’s program serihe revealed how he was taken from his parents and ously misled the children. A lesson on systemic put into care at seven years of age. He reached racism stood out. Many cultures practise systemic across and took a small doll from the house. He racism, discriminating against social minorities then added that numerous siblings had also gone most appallingly. Modern democratic countries, into care. More dolls were dramatically removed like Australia, have legislated to prevent it, impleand counted off, each representing a brother or sis- menting laws and regulations to guarantee equalter, leaving only his parents and eldest siblings. The ity—which is why many people wish to settle here. speaker then said that for the next nine years he had Ignoring this political reality, the youngsters were been “flogged” several times each informed that the modern world week and systematically “starved”. practises systemic racism. This is He was most insistent: flogged and dishonest. he speaker then starved. The camera turned to the And the coverage of Aborigines stricken class, revealing tears run- said that for the next in school history units was highning down children’s cheeks. lighted. Contrary to Marc Fennell’s nine years he had voice-over, most secondary schools n inference suggested through- been “flogged” several have indigenous material in their out the ABC’s show is that studies—it is a recurring point of times each week Australian schools are not addressat teaching conferences and systematically discussion ing racism. This is wrong. It also and workshops. What teachers are “starved”. He was concerned about is balance. The does an immense disservice to teachers, co-ordinators and princi- most insistent: flogged School That Tried to End Racism suppals, even the education unions. In plied a prime instance of this. The and starved. The classrooms and on school grounds class met the academic Dr Anna they have been quietly tackling Clark at the statue of James Cook camera turned to racism, sexism and prejudice for in Hyde Park. She spoke of Cook’s the stricken class, decades. And they use appropriate landing at Botany Bay, telling the revealing tears means matched to a child’s level of children the first thing the navigadevelopment. tor did was fire a shot over the heads running down In contrast, The School That of Aborigines on the beach. Dr children’s cheeks. Tried to End Racism takes young Clark complained that Australian pliable children and, disregarding history is biased and selective, with educational psychology, proceeds revealing facts like that shot edited to program them. Professor White even talks of out. Curiously, she did not explain to the children “intervening at primary school age” to engineer a that the warning shot was defensive, because the better society. Classes were quick and each deliv- Aborigines were throwing spears at Cook’s landing ered a clear, simple message. They did not require party. sustained thinking. rumming in a blunt message about white privTake the short talks on a range of topics given to ilege, the ABC’s program never mentioned its the class. Guest speakers looked at humour on television, assumptions about beauty in glossy maga- inverse: white trash. You can’t work in government zines, the use of images in media sports reports. schools, especially in urban regions of high disadThere was nothing remarkable in this material. All vantage, and miss children labelled white trash. The of it is already covered over Years 8 to 12 in second- Caucasian families they come from have endured ary schools, mostly within the English curriculum. hardship for generations and have been a permaBut adolescent students handle these matters in nent presence on social housing estates, in hospital depth and undertake analytical assignments. They outpatient clinics, in job-seeker programs, in all must intellectually work through the issues, reason- divisions of the welfare state, and, of course, in the courts. ing out what is involved. Children from these clan-like families do not Adolescents would also challenge certain lessons T A D Quadrant December 2021 23 How the ABC Teaches Kids Racism always stand out in a classroom. They are not necessarily bad or disruptive. But the adults behind them expect nothing of education, let alone see it as a step towards a potential career. Often parents didn’t themselves complete secondary school, and are either perpetually unemployed, or in and out of dead-end jobs. So no one at home is prodding the kids to make an effort, while schools push them through regardless at year’s end. It’s a dismal cycle. Despite being capable, the children remain under-achievers. One who sits in my memory was a fourteenyear-old I encountered when filling in at a school in Melbourne’s west. He had a cheeky sense of humour. I got him crafting short poems, much to the surprise of the English co-ordinator, as he hadn’t submitted written work for two years. On my last day he came up after class and said he’d enjoyed what we’d done, then confided he’d take the poems to show his mother, adding she was in prison “again”. This is a world away from the children participating in The School That Tried to End Racism. Bright, polite, articulate and attentive in class, these are beaut kids any teacher would be delighted to instruct. It’s obvious they were cherry-picked for the television program. These children from assorted cultures are living evidence of a harmonious society where peoples intermingle. Some are offspring of this nation’s ethnic melting pot. One boy claims descent from Irish, Italian, English and Scots migrants. A girl says her forebears came from Turkey, Kosovo and the Levant. And there are two mixed-race pupils who identify as indigenous, the boy with striking blue eyes declaring himself a “pale-skinned Aborigine”. Of course, there are confused non-Caucasian faces among those bundled into an affinity group and asked, “How do you feel about not being white?” Many don’t understand. How long silence lasts, and if answers are coaxed, is masked by an editorial cut. We jump to a Chinese-descent boy relating how his family was once abused in their car by a passing driver. And we skip to another boy talking of a friend wanting to use black pigment for face painting. Those are the only incidents to emerge when children are questioned; although both clips were shown several times across the ABC’s programs. Seeking stronger proof, the children’s parents were quizzed about encountering racism. One father tells his boy about unfair overtime allocations in a new workplace; but, he contended, once he settled in all was straightened out. Then there is the tearful 24 mother who recalls being ostracised in her teens by the daughters of Syrian migrants, because her own mother came from Kosovo. No narrator’s comment from Marc Fennell on this. The thrust of the classes is to drum into the children how some have bleak prospects due to ingrained racism. Not all are passive recipients. Told about past mistreatment of Aborigines, one girl protests that you can’t hold what happened in history against people living today. Then there is the boy of Bangladeshi descent who, after hearing Captain Cook accused of stealing the continent from Aborigines, responds we wouldn’t today be sharing in this prosperous beneficial society without the explorer. Later the same boy objects to the tone of classes, saying that modern Australia is fair and based on equality. Displeased at his egalitarian outlook, teachers suspect the boy’s migrant parents of sheltering him. A n elephant enters the room soon after the ABC’s documentary begins. The assistant principal at the school is a blonde-haired, blue-eyed Caucasian, while both the teachers under her are of Asian descent. Why did Marc Fennell not discuss this? Might the children see here white privilege in an Australian workplace, with systemic racism influencing staff advancement at their own school? Beyond this puzzle, The School That Tried to End Racism had me reflecting on my own early schooling. Preventing prejudice was high on the agenda, especially after Martin Luther King gave his “I Have a Dream” speech. It was all over our news media. King said he dreamt of the day when his children—my generation—lived in nations “where they will not be judged by the colour of their skin but by the content of their character”. We absorbed those spirited words as we grew up. They shaped how we lived and worked, especially those of us who embarked on careers in education. Professor Fiona White now wants to throw out Martin Luther King’s dream. Her vision for our schools is focused on judging children not by the content of their character, but by the colour of their skins. Each young child is to be told they bear a lifelong racial stigma for either not being, or worse still being, Caucasian. The Sydney University academic would even have teachers police who children mix with, formally marking pupils on their friends’ races. I eagerly await a parliamentary debate on her proposed curriculum changes. Christopher Heathcote lives in Melbourne. Quadrant December 2021 Copyright of Quadrant Magazine is the property of Quadrant Magazine Co Inc. and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use.