Ethnic-minority test to measure schools' success

Schools could face a new "ethnic minority test" to prove they have not failed their black and Asian pupils.

Schools could face a new "ethnic minority test" to prove they have not failed their black and Asian pupils.

In a shake-up of race policy in the education system, schools will have to show that such pupils have shared in rising standards.

And parents will be able to see for the first time if a school has treated their children fairly, with the publication of results showing how ethnic minority pupils have performed in each school in Britain.

The policy, to be put forward next month in a report by the Prime Minister's Downing Street think-tank, the Performance and Innovation Unit, comes amid growing concerns that black children, particularly teenage boys, are "written off" by teachers instead of encouraged to reach their full potential.

In their first years of primary school, black pupils match or outperform their white classmates, but from age 10 they swiftly lose ground. The proportion who achieve five good GCSE grades is less than half the national average.

Studies show that low educational achievement leads to higher unemployment and crime. Estelle Morris, the Secretary of State for Education, warned last month that 40 per cent of street crimes, a quarter of burglaries and a third of car thefts are carried out by 10 to 16-year-olds when they should be in school.

The Commission for Racial Equality called yesterday for the Government to produce "a national race strategy, part of which would include targets for raising the attainment of pupils by racial group".