7 minute read
Coastal poverty
Sally Gillen explores the often overlooked poverty suffered by coastal areas and the impact on their schools.
WHEN Eugene Doherty was 11, his Dad made him a porter-style buggy. On Saturday mornings, Eugene would wheel it down to the bus station in Morecambe, where he would meet holidaymakers off the bus and offer to carry their luggage to the hotel. It was a good way to earn some pocket money.
Two years ago – and 50 years later – Eugene found himself back in his home town, once again making deliveries. Only this time he was dropping off food parcels to the hotels, now converted into flats, as a volunteer for the local food bank.
This reflection on the Lancashire resort’s changing fortunes, which mirrors that of many others around the country, was shared by Eugene at this year’s NEU annual conference during a debate about the challenges experienced by schools and educators in coastal areas.
“I taught in London for around 20 years, in some of the poorest areas, including Tower Hamlets and Hackney, but I know that the idea that all the poor areas are in inner cities is not true,” he tells Educate.
Many overlooked factors influence educational attainment
Eugene returned to Lancashire after taking early retirement and worked for a time as a supply teacher at schools across the county. “A school in Blackpool on the south shore was the most challenging I’ve ever worked in,” he says.
Interestingly, however, the unique difficulties faced by schools on the coast do not get the attention they deserve. Instead, they are likely to be named and shamed for the achievements of their pupils. In 2019, for example, the Department for Education (DfE) released a report apparently showing pupils in coastal towns achieved three grades lower in their GCSEs.
The complex context in which these schools exist is not taken into account. Poor transport links, lack of investment and development, low-wage jobs, seasonal work, high levels of unemployment and geographical isolation all contribute to the high levels of poverty in many of these towns.
Busting the myth of the seaside idyll
Lynne Naylor (left), Holderness
Idyllic seaside life far from reality for many children
In Blackpool, arguably England’s most famous seaside resort, teachers such as Christine Butterworth work with children who are among the poorest in the country. DfE data for 2020/21 showed 73 per cent of children were eligible for free school meals (FSM).
At Christine’s school, around 40 per cent of children have FSM and Pupil Premium funding (at her previous school – also in Blackpool – it was 57 per cent) and all children are given breakfast and a carton of milk.
She feels there are many positives to working and living in Blackpool and is proud to be a teacher in the town. But it has its problems. Poverty is growing, she says. Many families do not own a car or catch buses, choosing to walk everywhere, meaning there are more and more children who do not travel beyond their local community.
Idyllic notions of children growing up by the seaside, spending hours playing on the beach and breathing in clean air, are some distance from the reality for the poorest children. Many rarely go to the beach.
“Blackpool can become quite insular and there are some families who have never moved away. This has a knock-on effect because it means the children do not get to experience what the north west and beyond can offer,” she says.
On school trips she hears children marvel at what are ordinary things, but which they have never seen before. One child excitedly named a brown cow “a new animal” because they had only seen ones that were black and white.
“A lot of the children go on a tram for the first time, feel the sand between their toes, or get overexcited about getting on a coach and going on the motorway,” she says. “These are things we take for granted but a lot of our seaside children haven’t experienced activities on their own doorstep, let alone further afield.”
Blackpool is a town that attracts those looking for seasonal work and low-cost housing. That creates challenges for teachers, explains Christine, because families are continually moving in and out.
“It becomes a transient area. In the classroom this means more children joining your class, setting up friendship groups, assigning a buddy, moving the seating around, and finding out where they are in terms of learning and understanding.” continued on page 29
Busting the myth of the seaside idyll
Words by Sally Gillen Portrait by Matt Wilkinson
continued from page 27
Blackpool needs investment and areas must be regenerated. “It needs to be attractive to families and businesses, not just the weekend lodgers,” she says.
Low wages and seasonal employment
Lynne Naylor, a support worker at a school in a rundown seaside resort on the Holderness coast in Yorkshire, also witnesses the poverty created by low wages and seasonal employment. All of which has been made so much worse by the cost-of-living crisis.
“Kids are cold. Kids are hungry. Kids are angry,” she says.
Holidaymakers and day trippers once arrived by coach and train, many of them from nearby Hull. Not anymore. “When you don’t have the people, you don’t have the development; when you don’t have the development, you don’t have the people,” explains Lynne. “I love living here but all of that is part of the challenge for our kids.”
Many rarely leave the town, which has a population of around 6,000, not even for the day. The train station closed in 1964. Buses are prohibitively expensive at £14 for an adult return and £9 for a child to Hull, the nearest city, an hour and a half away.
“It is so difficult to get anywhere,” says Lynne. “I’ve lived in the Scottish Highlands but when I arrived here, I felt like I had stepped back three or four decades.
“A lot of our children and young people who are from lower socio-economic backgrounds have their heads turned at 14 working in the bars or chippies for the summer. At that age, they think they are earning good money, so they think, ‘I’m
Helen Reeder (right), Portsmouth
not going to bother that much with school because I can do this job.’
“Ten years on, they are still doing that job and find they are living a life earning rubbish money. It becomes a vicious cycle.”
She believes the Government’s academisation agenda, with its focus on academia and obsession with looking at the many sub-levels of improvement from SATs to GCSEs, has drastically reduced the opportunities for young people in towns such as hers.
“The Government has done nowhere near enough to tackle the issues facing schools in coastal areas,” she argues. “Vocational education is a huge thing in coastal and rural towns and not having it adds to the poverty. My school doesn’t even have a sixth form anymore and this further lowers our young people’s aspirations. If you have to travel an hour and a half on the bus to go to sixth form, well, you just won’t go.
“And if young people aren’t interested in higher academic study, they don’t come to school because they can’t engage with the curriculum. A lot of them vote with their feet and don’t bother much with years 10 and 11, because they know there’s nothing for them at years 12 and 13. They accept they will go into seasonal work, do all right through the summer, try and muddle through the winter, and that’s them living their life in this town, doing it their way, because it’s all they can do.”
Christine Butterworth (left), Blackpool
Pockets of deprivation
In Portsmouth, primary teacher Helen Reeder also reflects on the social isolation experienced by many of her pupils, who live in flats on a very deprived council estate surrounding the school and rarely leave.
“We find that many of our children just don’t have experiences. In terms of learning, that impacts things like creative writing. One of the things we do at the school is have a list of ten things that children must experience before they leave, which include things like going to the theatre, going to the beach, going on a residential. For those families who can’t afford it, we use Pupil Premium funding.”
She adds: “I don’t think poverty in coastal towns is recognised. There’s this idea that it must be lovely to live by the seaside, but there are these pockets of children who are very deprived.
“We are close to the Hampshire border, and talking to colleagues there, children go off here, there and everywhere, but with our children you can’t even assume that they have been to the beach three miles away.”
