- Public meeting issues open letter to Headteacher at Manchester Academy about institutionalised racism (download the signed open letter here - PDF)
- Parents, former pupils and wider community call for public meeting at the school
The research (available in pdf at http://www.rapar.org.uk/key-steps-for-the-future.html) presented findings about what the city’s statisticians, teachers and Connexions staff and Somali families think about NEET: how the figures for NEET are created, who they relate to, and why there is a gap between what the statistics say and what young Somali people actually experience inside the education system.
The public meeting, called by the newly formed Somali Men’s Forum and facilitated by RAPAR listened as parents and young people themselves discussed the problems being experienced by Somali young people and their families. Manchester Academy Governor and local Councillor Alistair Cox, and the newly appointed GMP Chief Inspector of Neighbourhoods and Partnerships Arif Nawaz, who has responsibility for Longsight and Moss Side, also addressed the meeting. After listening to the families and the research presentation, Cllr Cox pledged to ensure that Local Authority workers look at the data about statistics that appear in the report and challenge them if necessary.
The meeting was an opportunity for the Somali Men’s Forum to enable their communities to articulate their concerns as a collective, and the researchers stressed that the purpose of the research process is not to apportion blame but to uncover what is going wrong educationally for young men from Somali backgrounds and contribute towards making that right.
Ultimately, the meeting decided to activate two areas of work immediately. Firstly to publish an Open Letter to the Headteacher of the Manchester Academy asking for a public meeting within the next two weeks at the school about the issues raised in the meeting, and to involve the parents from Claremont Road Junior school. Secondly they resolved to organise mentoring and counselling opportunities for young men from Somali backgrounds through the Manchester Somali Men's Forum.
For further information contact:
Ali Younis, Somali men’s Forum Executive Member, 07984274280
Ms Zeinab Mohamed, RAPAR Matron, 07411188555
Dr Rhetta Moran, RAPAR Matron, 07776264646