Quote of the Day

It has been suggested that permanent exclusion from school, may be the first step in the direction of exclusion from society (Blyth and Mimer, 1993). These authors warn of the dangers of viewing exclusion from school as a purely educational issue and refer to the idea of ‘civic exclusion”, of which exclusion from school forms one element. Civic exclusion is characterised by a constellation of disadvantage and inequality, including high unemployment, dependence on state benefits and services, poverty poor housing, debt and police and welfare surveillance.

The literature on employment suggests that, amongst other things having a job enforces a structure on the day, ties the individual in with reality and helps maintain psychological well-being (Warr, 1987). In support of this theory there is a wealth of research indicating that the unemployed do indeed have poorer mental health than their employed counterparts. While there has been no parallel research with young people of school-age it would not seem extreme to hypothesise that expulsion from school, where it results in little structured educational provision, would have similar results to becoming unemployed. It is highly likely that a young person expelled from school, who has no immediate alternative education, would not have any structure to their day and would quickly get out of the habit of going to school. Not only do these pupils run the risk of falling behind academically but they also miss the socialising aspect of normal school life. In some instances expulsion can have an adverse effect on relationships within the family where having a young person at home all day can lead to extra pressure on a family already having difficulty coping thus leading to social services intervention and possible periods in care (Fletcher-Campbell, 1997). Additionally, one could speculate that such young people may be at greater risk of becoming involved in deviant sub-cultures, or alternatively have greater opportunity to become more deeply involved in the type of illegal activity for which they may have been expelled in the first place (e.g. Devlin, 1995).

— ALEXANDRA BARR and DR ROSEMARY KILPATRICK
Barr, A. and Kilpatrick, R. (1998). Exclusions from school: The why and wherefore. Child Care in Practice: Northern Ireland Journal of Multi-disciplinary Child Care Practice Vol. 4(3), p.237