Equal Treatment and Cultural Difference in Multi‐ethnic Schools: a critique of the teacher ethnocentrism theory

ABSTRACT

This paper considers claims that students from minority ethnic backgrounds are treated less favourably than their white peers in schools because their teachers make negative, ethnocentric judgements of their behaviour. The paper challenges the empirical basis of these claims and the implicit model of good practice on which they are based. It goes on to examine some of the implications for teacher practice of this discussion. The aim is to try to clarify the meaning of equality of treatment in schools, a right we expect all citizens to enjoy, and to examine the way this principle should be operationalised by teachers in multi‐ethnic schools.