According to recent statistics, approximately 80% of students permanently excluded from schools are boys, about 8,000 of the 10,000 students excluded per year. In other words, boys are four times more likely to be thrown out of school than girls. Because of the knock-on effects of exclusion, principally poor education results at GSCE and in Higher Education, boys face a more difficult future than girls in searching for jobs.

All of us know someone who has been excluded from school. In fact, the Bow Group, a leading social research group, estimates one in five boys between 12 and 14 years old have been excluded for a fixed term (a few days or a week’s suspension from school) or permanently (when you have to move schools or educational institution). Many of us also remember the incidents that lead that person to be excluded; the time when they brought banned substances into school and got caught, or got into a fight or insulted a teacher. Permanent exclusions are not given for missing homework or for absence. Headteachers exclude students when in their judgement the student poses a risk to the education, health and safety of other students.

Exclusion from school was recently described by a Home Office report as “essentially a boy problem”. If exclusion is about health and safety, it is easy to see why it tends to happen to boys rather than girls. Boys are, on the whole, more violent than girls. They form gangs and carry weapons; in my school two students have been permanently excluded this year for bringing knives into school. Boys are also more likely to be violent and/or abusive to members of staff. A student in school recently head butted a teacher. Miraculously, he avoided permanent exclusion.

Serious violence, however, is an extreme case and rarely occurs between students or between students and teachers. That is not to say teachers do not feel threatened; many do a lot of the time. This feeling of insecurity is fuelled by a sometimes misinformed perception of young men. Not many young men are actually violent or abusive. Girls have a similar capacity for disrespect, bullying and even violence, but teachers do not feel threatened by them. Because boys’ behaviour appears more threatening to teachers, it is the boys’ behaviour they often seek to control.

Boys who are trying to turn over a new leaf are often also held back by teachers’ scepticism and their focus on bad behaviour. Boys find themselves criticised at every step and their improvements not recognised; one student summarised his problems in school – “I get in trouble no matter what; trouble just seems to follow me around the school.” A male student may be badly behaved but some teachers fixate only on the bad behaviour. Liz Wilson, a teacher of 30 years standing, contacted C.A.L.M to point out how little notice teachers and schools give to small improvements in boys’ behaviour. In my school many students feel not enough is done to recognise their improved behaviour and the incentives to improve – usually reward trips at the end of term – are not immediate enough to matter.

Of course every boy has a different experience in school. Rates of exclusion vary widely between communities; Black Caribbean boys, for example, are three times more likely to be excluded than white boys. Much also depends on a boy’s academic level and their parent’s commitment to fight their corner. In school one teacher drew a comparison between two students who have faced permanent exclusion. One, with full support from his parents and 5 A-Cs GCSE predicted grades, stayed in school whilst the other was forced to find alternative education. His mother could not read the school’s letter informing her of her son’s exclusion.

The scale of the problem of male exclusion has not been properly recognised by either government or individual schools. There have been no concerted policies from the current government to reduce the exclusion rate. Many schools lack co-ordinated policies to prevent exclusion. A Learning Mentor described our school’s policies as “pick and mix” – with anger management offered to some and behaviour reports to Head of Years and Headteachers offered to others. There are no clear stepping stones for dealing with bad behaviour. Because the consequences of bad behaviour are not clear, some boys are not likely to modify their behaviour.

Many feel they are at the whim of their teacher’s perceptions; in such an unfair world, some boys do not feel responsible for and in control of their own destiny.

Tom Sawbridge