Interviewer: Cat
Interviewee: Ruth Pickersgill
Introductions
Cat (00:00:00):
On this computer. Fab. Brilliant, hi. So hi
Ruth:
Okay. I’m
Disability provision in education
Cat (00:00:55):
Fab. Thank you. So today we’re going to be mainly talking about your work around
Disability provision in
Ruth:
Okay. Well, it started way back in
Ruth:
One was a training project, mainly training people in either office skills, or in
catering. And we ran another project, which was helping people with employments. We had
people who would help get rid of the barriers to employment, so we had somebody work with
them on housing, somebody work with them on getting the right education qualifications.
We had a social worker who might support if they needed PA support, that sort of thing.
Ruth:
So I got involved there, and I went into it not actually knowing very much about
Cat:
So what was the motivating factors for you getting… Making that real focus switch to
the
Ruth:
Well, I became, sorry, I’m fighting a cat here who wants to sit in my lap. I became
really interested in schools because I was a teacher. So originally, I was a teacher. I
always wanted to carry on being a teacher, but because I’d become so Disabled, I couldn’t
really do much. Because in those days, you still had to write on blackboards. And you
still had to do PE sessions, and everything else. There was no concept of
Inclusive education movement
Ruth (00:04:07):
So once I found out about the
Ruth:
So I was able to get quite involved in
Ruth:
So what we’ve managed to do, a lot of people have been on this steering group, a lot of
Disabled people, particularly somebody called
Ruth:
We pushed really hard for the council to adopt an
Ruth:
So their children would go along with their teacher and with their LSAs, but they’d start
to be in a mainstream setting. So they’d get the advantages of play times and
lunchtimes, all those things. But also they’d get opportunities to go into different
lessons, and gradually experience the mainstream settings. So we call them inclusion
classes. So we did quite a lot of those in a number of schools around
Ruth:
And then the third bit was around physical changes. So we decided we were going to close
the secondary provision of Broward Special School and Elmfield Special School, and move
it onto a mainstream site. So we created the… Well it’s now at Bristol Met. because
the schools have all changes names. But Bristol Met. has a secondary provision for
children with severe learning difficulties on-site. Oh and Bedminster Down ended up with
a provision for physically impaired young people. And so did Brislington School and…
Which was the other one I just mentioned? Oh, Elmfield. So that was an interesting one.
Elmfield School for Deaf Children. We closed their secondary provision, and Fairfield
school was then being rebuilt at the time. So we built a deaf provision within Fairfield
school. So all of those, the idea was that it… Because parents were so keen on
special education, we weren’t saying, “No, we’re just going to dump you in mainstream and
that’s the end of it.”
Ruth:
We were trying to say, we’ll take the expertise, and the learning and the good practice
from special schools, but put them into mainstream settings. So the children have a lot
more chances to be included and integrated, and meet with their peers. And have a much
wider academic opportunity as well.
Ruth:
So for example, there was a lot of children from Kingsweston School who are on the
autistic spectrum. And they were in the special school, but they moved over to an
inclusion class in Portway School, which meant they could then access mainstream GCSEs,
but also have somewhere to go back to if they needed any specialist support, or a bit of
a quiet time or whatever. So they had a base, but they could move out into more lessons.
So it just widened the opportunities I think, for a lot of children.
Cat:
[inaudible 00:09:28] Yeah. It sounds really, really good. Really useful. Did you come
up against any challenges during this work? Not necessarily opposition, but just
anything that maybe you found difficult or had to work around, or challenges to attitudes?
Gaining trust from special schools
Ruth (00:09:46):
Yeah. We were very, very unpopular with the special schools, who thought we were just
trying to close them down. And it took a lot of hard work to try and gain the trust.
And I think what happens in most of them was there’d be one or two people within the
school who would understand what we were doing, why we’re trying to do it. And were
really good allies, and we worked with them. But there were others who were completely
opposed to it, and just thought that we were completely loud and we just wanted to close
special schools, and they didn’t really understand why. Because there were a lot of
Disabled adults involved in this work, and they didn’t see why Disabled adults should be
having their say in what Disabled young people wanted. Because they thought the parents
should be deciding. And on the whole, a lot of the parents were preferring the special
schools because they felt safer and they have good relationships with the staff and
everything else. So there were tensions with parent groups, and there were tensions with
the special schools, be fair to say.
Cat:
Yeah. I can imagine that would be quite difficult. But did it manage to rectify in the
end? Did people get used to it after a while, and it settled down? Did you achieve the
results you were hoping to longer-term after a while?
Ruth:
Well, we did, but it needs constant revisiting and revitalizing I think, because you can
put people somewhere, but then it needs an awful lot of work to make it happen. And I
think it only continued where there were people who had the commitment to make it work.
And in other places I’m really disappointed, because my post was deleted because they
felt that the work had started to happen and it would just carry on. So I got a
different job as a qualities manager, and they just assumed it was going to happen, but I
think it needed people to carry on being dedicated in doing that. So I’m really
disappointed for example, in Bristol Met. I go there quite often because I lived nearby,
and I don’t see any integration between the children with learning difficulties and the
children in Bristol Met. And I don’t think there’s even a plan for that inclusion to
happen really.
Lessons learned for the future
Cat (00:12:05):
So yeah. So leading on from that, what would you say, for your personal opinion, of
lessons learned for the future, or next steps needed to continue that work? If you could
wave a magic wand and fix anything to make it continue?
Ruth:
Well, I mean, I think we’d have to start again now, because I think everything has got
forgotten. So people don’t even know we’ve got an
Cat:
Yeah. Okay. Brilliant. Thank you very much. That’s all really, really interesting to
learn about. So thinking about your next project regarding Disability provision, I think
you mentioned you were an Inclusion Officer just a moment ago. How did you move on to
that, apart from your post being deleted? Was it linked to your first project? Or tell
me a little bit about the next thing you moved on to?
Inclusion and equality
Ruth (00:13:34):
Well I was inclusion coordinator first, and then I moved into being equalities manager.
[crosstalk 00:13:36] That way round. So I then managed a team that was wider than just
looking at Disability. So my team looked at race issues and gender, and well any sort of
equalities issues, and manage the supplementary schools provision, and the school
transport, and various other things. So it was a much wider remit, but within that, I
was still able to do some of the inclusion work. So I think the project that I’m most
pleased with I think, was that we established something called the
Ruth:
But they had to prove that they’d linked with special schools, that they’d done inclusion
work, they’d done access audits. They’d looked at the curriculum, see how they include
Disabled people in the curriculum. They’ve done all sorts of work in order to get that
reward. And I think it was a really good way of moving schools along. And it’s
interesting now, because some of the people who were teachers then, working on that
inclusion model, and now head teachers, because this was still in the
Ruth:
And again, some of the teachers who came on that went on to be real advocates for
inclusion. Some of them were special schools’ teachers, some of them were mainstream,
but they were able to take that learning back into their schools. So I think it’s really
important to have the space for people to be able to look at the academic research and
the background, because I wasn’t an academic researcher. I knew it was the right thing
and I could see it working, but it was really important to let people explore the
academic side of it as well I think.
Cat:
Yeah, definitely. I think that sounds really interesting. And did you come up any
challenges in that work? What sorts of challenges, or not so much?
Ruth:
I think just the usual ones of working with schools really. It’s difficult for teachers
to get the time to do what they need to do, and it’s on top of everything else. You try
and organize event… Because we had quite a lot of events, so we’d have a lot of
showcasing of good practice.
Ruth:
So for example, we were talking last time about
Cat:
What were the results of this second project? Again, did you feel that you managed to
achieve the aims you’d set out initially?
Ruth:
Yeah, we did. I mean, we achieved in that they reached that initial standard, but the
idea always was that that wouldn’t be the end point. You’d always carry on learning
more, and improving more. But again, we ended up… Because equality’s where it went
out to fashion in about
Inclusion not Integration
Cat (00:18:03):
Yeah. So the next steps you would say are to get that going again, or would you say
there are… What else would you think, if you wanted to get this off the ground again,
what would the next steps be would you say?
Ruth:
I think the main thing is to start from the beginning, and actually look at what
inclusion is, and what an inclusive school is, and how we can get our schools to move to
that point. But I think it’s coming from a different place now, because it’s coming from
a [inaudible 00:18:28] special educational needs and Disability perspective now, because
I’m sure people probably know, but every single [inaudible 00:18:38] council in the
country is hugely overspent on its [inaudible 00:18:41] budget. And as a result of that,
the government is pushing people to do things. Well, you can keep getting more people…
I can only say the acronyms. EHCPs, which are education, health care plans. I have to
think, because I’m so used to the acronyms. And you can just get more and more people to
have EHCPs and to be then put into schools, or you can make the schools more inclusive so
people don’t need EHCPs. Their needs will be met.
Ruth:
But we’ve gone so far the other way with schools just saying, “Oh, I haven’t got any
money. I can’t have that child because I haven’t got any money.” Half the time, the
issue isn’t the money. The issue’s the attitudes and the inclusive ways of working. So
I think we’ve gone so far the other way that we’ve got to really pull it back, and start
saying to schools, “Actually, you do have a duty to make your provision more inclusive
for most people.” And it should be a very rare when you need additional funding. But
schools don’t even very often know where their money goes, because they get 6,000 pounds
per pupil who’s got special educational needs, or a Disability. But they can’t ever tell
you what they’re doing with that 6,000. It just goes into their pots. And then they’re
saying, “No, we need extra money.” But you say, “Well, what have you done with the
6,000?” And they can’t tell you.
Cat:
I guess that links slightly…. It sounds like it links to the
Ruth:
Totally.
Cat:
Yeah. Would you have any thoughts on that, and how that could play into this?
Ruth:
Well, I think it’s completely about that really. Because my take on the
Ruth:
And for me it’s also about the difference between integration and inclusion. And we used
to talk about that a lot, that integration. You put a Disabled child into a mainstream
setting but you expect them to fit in with everything that everyone else does. Whereas
inclusion is about changing the school, and the whole way the school operates, to meet
the needs of the children and the Disabled adults. Because people forget that there are
loads of parents who are Disabled, or teachers who are Disabled, and they don’t ever get
a mention really. So if you made your school inclusive, then there’d be a whole lot of
parents who’d be able to be far more involved in the life of the school than they can
normally, or grandparents, or anybody else.
Cat:
Definitely. Yeah, definitely. Thank you. Do you have any other projects in particular
that you want to tell us about, that were really stood out to you as important or
memorable? And don’t worry, if not.
Disabled students
Ruth (00:21:56):
I think those are probably the main ones. I mean the other one I’d probably mention is
work I’ve done since I did all of that. I left and went to
Ruth:
They just wanted to not be noticed really. They didn’t want to assert their rights. And
so in both places, we started Disabled students’ groups and work with them, and with
their student unions as well, around trying to change the model from a medical to a
social one to say, it’s actually not anyone’s problem, but it’s also not a favour to ask
[inaudible 00:23:17] it’s actually a right. You should have a right to these things.
And it was really nice to see some of the students just really blossom.
Ruth:
I think of one student at St. Brendan’s who had major issues with dyslexia and other
things, and didn’t identify as Disabled at all. And he started talking to me and came to
the group, and I kept giving examples of me. And I kept saying, when I went for this
interview, I said, “No, I’m not going to do this interview because it’s completely
inaccessible.”
Ruth:
And I kept putting it back to me all the time. He gradually got it. And I saw him a
while ago, I just bumped into him in the street, and he’d gone to UWE and he’s just got
his degree, and is really pleased with what happened. And he said to me, “I used my
Disabled students grant and I got everything that I was entitled to.” It was really
great. So made me feel that that’s… Just changing that mind shift, because it’s ever
so easy to get put off when people don’t meet your needs.
When people don’t meet your needs
Ruth (00:24:23):
And still, even now as a councillor, I started as a councillor in
Ruth:
If I can’t get what I need as a local councillor, how on earth do Disabled children in
schools get what they need? I feel passionately about that. That was what worked really.
Cat:
Definitely. So thinking overall, we’ve talked a little bit about the results of
individual projects. Overall, your career in inclusion and integration, all of that.
What do you think the impact was of your work in these areas, either your personal impact
or the impact of focus groups and projects you worked with?
Ruth:
I think the main impact really was for educational professionals to be interacting
regularly with Disabled people, and hearing their views and hearing their stories. And
I’m beginning to understand them. I think that’s what’s missing in so much now, that
that dialogue doesn’t go on. And if you go through your life never meeting any Disabled
adults, then you’re not going to be thinking about how to make your provision, whether
it’s a school or whether it’s adult care, or whatever it is. You’re just not going to
think about how to make it inclusive. So I think that whole thing about dialogue, which
is why we’re now focusing quite a lot on how can we bring the voice of Disabled people
back again, into planning and particularly into education. Because it’s not there at all
in education.
We need a Disability Commission
Cat (00:26:14):
No. So I’m guessing, is that what you would like to see in the future of Disability
provision and inclusion, or is there something else that you would… If you could write
a 10-year road plan for what you’d like to see happen in the next five to 10 years, what
sorts of things would be on there?
Ruth:
Well in education, I’d certainly like to see a revised inclusive education policy with a
really clear strategy, and an action plan with timescales. But wider than that, what I’m
really keen to see is a Disability commission. Because I think for [inaudible 00:26:41],
we need to have a Disability commission because there are a number of Disabled groups,
but they’re all doing things separately. They don’t work together.
Ruth:
And I think if we could bring together everybody under a Disability commission, and have
the right people there who’ve got power and influence, I think we could maybe start to
have more of a citywide dialogue. I think Disabled people have got left out of the one
city plan, and all the planning around going forward really.
Wrapping up
Cat (00:27:13):
Definitely. I would love to see that as well. And so is there anything else you would
like to add about this topic area? Anything we haven’t covered that springs to mind, or?
No worries if not, but just giving you the option.
Ruth:
No, I don’t think so. I think that probably covers it.
Cat:
Brilliant. Well, thank you very much. I will end the recording here, and then we’ll do
our brief chat about consent and all of that [inaudible 00:00:27:34]. If you press
[crosstalk 00:27:35]
Ruth:
So I press the pause or the stop. The stop.
Cat:
Press the stop video. No that’s me, no. Press the stop recording, up in the top.