Harmony News Magazine

In this issue of Harmony, we look back at the history of the Stephen Lawrence Education Standard in Leeds, with a focus on its community founders.

Some idea of the deep commitment of all those involved with it today is conveyed in the report on the Annual Awards Ceremony which can be found on pages one and two.

This issue also reports on some of the highlights of the third Gypsy Roma Traveller History Month held in June, a national initiative driven by the leadership and passion of our Leeds GRT Achievement Service.

Issues of human rights for Gypsies, Roma and Travellers continue to be a serious problem across Europe.

Their persecution has a long history. We need to make every effort to ensure that it ceases, and this can only happen through solidarity and partnership, challenging injustice when it occurs.

We pay tribute to Peter Saunders,

recently retired, who has worked with

great commitment and integrity to

ensure that children and young people

from GRT communities in Leeds can access education and have confidence

Issue 8 November 2010

News magazine of the Stephen Lawrence Education Standard in Leeds

Ten Years of Achievement

Celebrating at the Annual Awards Ceremony

Suitcase Circus

Faith Cluster

Black Shakespearian

Veteran Campaigner

Continued page 2

Wavin’ FlagThe theme song for the Awards Ceremony this year was Wavin’ Flag by hip-hop artist K’Naan.

The Editor writes:

The theme song for the Awards Ceremony this year was Wavin’ Flag by hip-hop artist K’Naan.

It could not have been more appropriate, and was instantly picked up by the hundreds of pupils, teachers, community representatives and guests packed into Space@Hillcrest on 20 October, most of whom recognised it as from the World Cup in South Africa.

When I get older I will be stronger

They'll call me freedom, just like a wavin' flag

Delivered with enormous gusto by the excellent Little London Primary School Community Choir, it soon had the audience fully involved.

It came after the official opening by the Deputy Lord Mayor, Councillor Patrick Davey, and an introduction from Rehana Minhas and Patricia Farrell. Louise Crumbie, Chair of the Stephen Lawrence Education Standard Partnership followed, with a brief

history of the ceremony. Patricia Farrell

introduced each programme item with

efficiency and gentle good humour.

Students from Cardinal Heenan

Catholic High School used large bricks

made from painted cardboard boxes in

a powerful presentation, each inscribed

with the name of black leaders and

champions, chosen by classes.

After Rehana Minhas had surveyed the last ten years, ending with a vision of future progress, the first keynote address was given by His Excellency Dr James Williams, the High Commissioner for St Kitts and Nevis, who spoke of his happiness at being invited on “such an auspicious occasion”.

“Usually I speak about things like trade and industry, or passports. I would


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to see their aspirations fulfilled. His legacy will continue in the work of a brilliant team.

It was very pleasing to find out that Hackney Council will continue to honour the great Caribbean intellectual CLR James (see page 13) and that the new Dalston Library will carry his name and hold his many works, which range from literature and politics to economics, history and cricket. He lived in London,

and often visited Leeds, where he spoke at seminars and encouraged

young people to value education and

champion equality and human rights.

We now have many success stories of

authorities and schools outside Leeds

who have committed themselves to

championing the Stephen Lawrence

Education Standard, and we look

forward to continuing the work of

promoting race equality and community cohesion in Leeds and nationally.

At a time of public cuts and economic recession it is essential that the values of equality, justice, peace continue to be central to our thinking.

Rehana Minhas, Director of Equality and Entitlement

Continued from front page

Little London Primary School Community Choir

much prefer to speak on this theme: Together We Can Make a Better Future, with the word Together highlighted.”

Education Leeds’s CEO Chris Edwards pledged his continuing passionate support for the SLES Partnership, and his tribute was reciprocated, because he received an award himself later on for his constant advocacy and support.

Other strong keynote addresses were delivered by Councillor Jane Dowson and by Dr Tony Cotton, Associate Dean at the Faculty of Sport and Education, Carnegie Leeds Metropolitan University, but of course the stars were the children, all of them brimming with energy and commitment.

Actor Joe Williams appeared at the lectern in role as the great bass-baritone and human rights campaigner from 1936, Paul Robeson, and managed to include a book recommendation in his speech – The Black Jacobins by CLR James.

A presentation by students from Prince Henry’s in Otley illustrated the school’s work for human rights around the world, and the strength of its

engagement with the Standard.

The performing arts have always been

the essential strand in the Awards

Ceremony: there were well-rehearsed

contributions from Broomfield SILC,

Brudenell, Wigton Moor, Hillcrest,

and Pudsey Southroyd Primary

Schools. Eva’s Story, the dance drama

performed by Rawdon St Peter’s Church

of England Primary School, a sensation

last year, was experienced again

on DVD.

Two talented pianists – Yingzhe Feng

from St Mary’s Catholic Primary

School and Jordan Liburd from Benton

Park High School, were applauded

until hands must have hurt, and the

poems delivered by students from

Ralph Thoresby High School were both

spirited and sensitive.

This year, at the last ceremony under

the auspices of Education Leeds, and

the first after the national launch,

the awards presented to school

delegations seem to have been

accepted with extra pride – and the

assessors received certificates to mark

their contributions as well.


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Performance from Hillcrest

Dr James Williams

Presentation from Prince Henry’s

Yingzhe Feng


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by Richard Wilcocks

“Come with me on the road, back to those days when it was time to pack up and get going,” says Jess Smith. She is talking to an audience of Year 5 pupils.

“I want you to imagine that, as my friends, you are by the campfire listening to the magical Scottish stories that have been handed down through generations of travellers.”

The children are gripped. Her story, a real spine-tingler, involves Sandy, an old piper, sheltering under a beech hedge from a heavy snowstorm. He has become separated from a cattle drive from the Isle of Skye.

He becomes aware of a dead man sprawled next to him, wearing a fine pair of boots, and as his own footwear is worn-out, he decides to take them for himself, but they will not come off because the corpse is frozen solid. So he takes out his big knife and…

Eyes open wide. These children have a taste for the macabre, and a tale expertly told.

Jess Smith is an author, a storyteller and a fine singer with a string of books to her name, including an autobiographical trilogy which begins with the bestselling Jessie’s Journey.

This tells how her mother was born in

a tent, and her aunts and uncles were described on official forms as tinkers, hawkers and itinerants. She herself lived from the ages of five to fifteen with her parents, sisters and a mongrel dog, in an old blue Bedford bus.

Her latest book is Sookin’ Berries – Tales of Scottish Travellers, which is aimed at younger readers – and listeners.

Her session ends with the singing of When The Boat Comes in – in the Cant, one of the ancient languages of Scottish travellers.

Saffron and Curtis from Rayneville Primary School took part in the day’s events:

A spine-tingler

The third one took place in June, with an aim to raise awareness of Gypsy, Roma and Traveller history and culture and to celebrate the music, the art and the contribution they have made throughout the five hundred years they have lived in Britain.

A series of workshops took place at the West Park Centre. These were led by artist Ferdinand Koci, storyteller Jess Smith, Venezuelan flamenco dancer Carla Soto, and Peter White from Suitcase Circus.

The month in Leeds culminated in the annual award ceremony in the Civic Hall, which combined recognition of the achievements of Gypsy, Roma and Traveller children with prize-giving for the portrait competition.

Growing steadilyGypsy Roma Traveller History Month is steadily growing and developing, locally and nationally.

For detailed information and resources, visit www.grtleeds.co.uk

Some winners of the portrait competition with (from the left) Richard Naylor (Captain of Leeds United), champion boxer Jimmy Lowther, Lord and Lady Mayoress, Andrea Smith (GRT Policy adviser at the DfE) and Chris Edwards (CEO Education Leeds)


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SAFFRON: It was great watching Ferdinand draw pictures, like the one he did of my friend Chloe, which was brilliant.

We drew our own, on polystyrene which then got inked before we printed them.

CURTIS: The story we heard from Jess Smith was a little frightening but I really liked it.

And… for the first time ever I balanced a peacock feather on my finger and then on my nose. This was funny because you’re not used to that kind of weight on your face.

It was when we worked with Pete from Suitcase Circus.

SAFFRON: Circus people and fairground people are often travellers. This is something new I have learned.

CURTIS: And some famous people have travellers in their family – like Wayne Rooney.

In the portrait competition, people of all ages were invited to create a Gypsy, Roma and Traveller portrait real or imaginary, from the past, present or future.

This was an international competition. The awards at the ceremony were for the Leeds region, with winners going forward to the international version.

Roma life is depicted as a pastoral idyll in the works of embroidery artist Marketa Sestakova.

An exhibition at the Thackray Museum was endorsed by the Czech government in a joint venture with the Gypsy Roma Traveller Achievement Service, which was one of the outcomes of an April visit by a Leeds delegation to its partner city Brno.

At the end of June, a delegation from Brno came to visit the exhibition and to attend the GRT Achievement Awards Evening in the Civic Hall.

Leeds Gypsies and Travellers: Then and NowIn the Victorian splendour of Leeds Central Library, an exhibition of photographs, everyday and historical items and video was presented at the end of May 2010, in time for the following month’s Gypsy Roma Traveller History Month.

Peter White from Suitcase Circus with Kyan and Chloe from Blackgates Primary


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Koci has a growing reputation in Leeds as a leader of lively and enriching workshops for all ages which combine art appreciation with practical work.

Trained at the School of Art of the University of Tirana, Albania – he was the first Roma to attend – many of his pieces are depictions of Romani life which share motifs with traditional stereotypes, full of horses, guitars, men with hats, long dresses and open fires.

Others have a kind of Renaissance religious quality, with fine lines, cherubs dancing in the sky and haloed Christs.

Yet others are related to the art of greetings cards, with large-eyed cute children, black-haired beauties and doses of broad humour, but there is much more: a disturbing world lurking behind the idealisation.

The Machine of Death (I Maqina E Merimasko) for example, ink on burnt paper, shows anguished faces, striped clothing and the chimneys of the crematoria at Auschwitz, a reminder of the Roma victims of the Holocaust.

This exhibition shows Koci as passionate, proud and highly

knowledgeable about his own history. He is a consummate storyteller whose superb technical skill could easily eclipse that of many other visual artists who have achieved fame.

Consummate storytellerFerdinand Koci’s exhibition opened in September at the West Park Gallery.

Farewell to PeterPeter Saunders joined the Travellers Education Service, as it was then called, in 1980.

He has just retired as manager of the Gypsy Roma Traveller Achievement Service. “Initially, it was just me,” he told Harmony.

"Most of the children didn’t attend school at all and I visited them in a mobile classroom. It was very different to my previous post teaching in an Otley middle school.

Then I started introducing children into primary schools, one group at a time – it was mornings in Gildersome and afternoons in Cross Green.

As time went on, more schools began to welcome travellers and more parents began trusting the system. Travellers Education was able to provide advice, assistance and catch-up programmes.

I couldn’t be everywhere, though, and reports highlighting the situation were read and acted upon in the Leeds Education Department. Our staff was increased, with funding coming from the ‘No Area Pool’ at the old Department of Education and Science.

We were able to develop cultural resources, for example the book we published in 2000 entitled Gypsies and Travellers in Their Own Words.

We have added a lot more since then, and we have been major instigators in the development of Gypsy Roma Traveller History Month.

One of the most exciting developments has been our relationship with the Czech Republic. I was one of the initiators of this link".

Claire Lockwood has been appointed as the new manager.

Ferdinand Koci

Peter was presented with this work by Roma embroidery artist Marketa Sestakova)


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The anklung was funDiversity Week at Westgate Primary School in Otley took place in June.

Three pupils – Izzy, Sam and Anna – spoke to Harmony about some of the events:

IZZY: We heard lots of stories, including one about the vanishing rainforest, and on every page of the book we did actions when the freeze points came.

We also all played a musical instrument from Indonesia called an anklung, which was fun. This is made of bamboo tubes in a frame.

We played it as a group, each person shaking it to make a different note. We played the theme from the film Titanic and Danny Boy.

I think I learned a lot about other countries.

SAM: In PE we did a World Cup competition, which I enjoyed the most, and I took part in a drumming workshop. I also did some Bollywood dancing, which was very energetic.

We listened to some of Benjamin Zephaniah’s poems and learned about his life. He had a mixed up childhood and was bullied because he was black.

ANNA: I remember the lyrics of the song Slash and Burn, which taught me about how selfish people can be. We should look after the rainforests!

I enjoyed Benjamin Zephaniah’s poems the best, though. They taught me a lot about racism and the way people behave.

My two favourites were Talking Turkeys and Who’s Who. I learned all the words of Who’s Who.

The week was important because it was

about treating people fairly.

Headteacher Rhona Bignall added: “It was very much about all the schools in Otley working together.

The week provided a focus and an emphasis, drawing attention to the work we do in the curriculum throughout the year.”

Izzy (Year 3), Sam (Year 6) and Anna (Year 4)

“This is a massively important message,” said local MP Greg Mulholland.

“It’s a great day, and wonderful that all the schools have managed to combine their efforts to teach it.” He was commenting on the launch of the Otley Family of Schools Anti-Racism Charter in June.

The event, held at the end of June in Otley Town Courthouse, was attended by groups of children who

presented performances of dance, drama and poetry.

Otley Town Mayor Ray Smith described the event as “a real triumph”.

Otley Family of Schools is made of the following primaries – Adel, All Saints (C of E), Ashfield, Bramhope, Pool (C of E), St Joseph’s (RC), The Whartons and Westgate, along with Prince Henry’s Grammar School Specialist Language College.

A real triumph

It was attended by four hundred and fifty delegates, including the former Secretary of State, Ed Balls MP.

The Standard was developed in partnership between Education Leeds, Leeds City Council and Black and Minority Ethnic community representatives, in response to the Macpherson Report, and this partnership has strengthened and grown in the past seven years to include many more groups, with most areas of the city represented.

The dominant thinking when the Stephen Lawrence Education Award was first established in October 2000 was that the initiative should be far more than a mere poster campaign, but proactive, constructive and imaginative, in the spirit of the law. The time was right for something which would

deliver significant change, something

which would translate Macpherson’s

recommendations into action.

Black and Minority Ethnic community

representatives engaged in Leeds

City Council’s Race Equality Advisory

Forum were active in ensuring that this

happened. The driving force behind

the Standard’s development has been

Leeds Education’s director of equality

and entitlement, Rehana Minhas.

The Award was the first of its kind

in the country, and was designed to

acknowledge and celebrate existing

good practice in promoting race

equality and achievement in schools,

encourage all schools to place a

commitment to racial equality at the

centre of their curriculum, policy and

practice, provide a focus for race

equality initiatives in schools across the city and provide an opportunity for schools to share effective practice.

Work on the Standard has gone hand in hand with the development of the Education Leeds quality framework for school self evaluation, now known as Bluewave SWIFT.

The Standard is relevant to all learning settings (it was launched for early years in 2005) and its strength has been the partnership approach. From the early days heads and staff from schools who have achieved the top level of the standard have worked to encourage others to engage, with the support of community members and officers of Education Leeds and the City Council.

The partnership approach led to the Morley Family of Schools working in collaboration in 2006/2007 to achieve the Standard. Today, clusters of schools work across the city in different localities to address issues of racism and community cohesion systematically, with the involvement of area-based services and agencies.

In 2007, the introduction of Harmony, the termly news magazine of the Standard, marked the engagement of the majority of our schools. Each issue is distributed to all Leeds schools, with many readers elsewhere.

We now have comprehensive resources including DVDs of work in classrooms. Currently more than eighty percent of Leeds schools have achieved one of the three levels of the Standard. The highest level of revalidation at present is Bronze.

Leeds delegates at the National Launch


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How the Standard startedThe national launch of the Stephen Lawrence Education Standard in Leeds took place on 22 January this year at Saviles Hall.


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Many people are surprised that Leeds took the initiative independently to be proactive about our response to the tragic murder of Stephen Lawrence.

The Leeds Stephen Lawrence Education Partnership has kept Mrs Doreen Lawrence and the Stephen Lawrence Trust in London informed of our work here. Mrs Lawrence has been to Leeds to see first hand the impact of the Standard.

At the national launch she urged other local authorities to follow Leeds’s leadership and commitment to race equality and community cohesion.

I remember just after we started. I was at the first Annual Award Ceremony, and stood on the stage looking

out. When I saw all the schools gathered there, with so many children, I knew in my heart that we had done the right thing.

Talking to the children involved, I am often amazed by the way they talk about racial equality and Stephen’s death, and the quality of their performances on stage in front of others.

Now I am looking towards even more developments in the Standard in the future.

Parklands Girls High School was the first to achieve the award after producing some excellent

work in late 2000.

I was part of the team that did the school assessment visit with the founder of the scheme, Maureen Baker, and several other colleagues.

Having previously worked as a Lay Ofsted inspector

I was familiar with the routine of observing

class teaching, the behaviour and attitude of pupils and the

quality of displays around the school.

Nevertheless assessing the first school was a daunting experience because this was part of a scheme that did not have the status of an Ofsted inspection and it was not certain how we would be received by schools and how seriously they would take an intervention from lay community activists and Leeds City Council staff.

I need not have been concerned. From the start we were well received and it was clear that the whole school took the Stephen Lawrence Award very seriously and had prepared well for it.

Since then the reputation and the status of the award has grown beyond anything we might have imagined at the time of that first school visit.

Louise Crumbie writes: Chair, Stephen Lawrence Education Standard Partnership

Patricia Farrell writes:

Tony Stanley writes: Director of Leeds Racial Equality Council

The community members hewed out the path at the right time and for the right reasons: protection of our generations of the future, ensuring they would never forget the incident or the solutions.

Working together in full partnership has kept the community members leading and pushing to maintain the passion, creativity, spirituality, morals and values that is the rock of the Stephen Lawrence Education Standard.

Member, Stephen Lawrence Education Standard Partnership


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Maureen Baker MBEBorn in Dublin as Maureen Meehan in 1935, Maureen Baker has devoted her life to challenging racism.

She first came to Leeds in 1953 to study Law at the university. In 1958 she intervened when a West Indian man was refused a ticket in a local library and this incident sparked her commitment to the anti-racist movement. Her work has spanned five decades and includes founding local groups, working for the Anti-Apartheid movement and even several years in Africa on an Overseas Aid Programme.

When the national Campaign Against Racial Discrimination (CARD) was formed in 1964, Maureen became the Leeds Secretary and Regional Organiser for Yorkshire and the North East. In the same year, she contributed to the formation of the Anti-Apartheid movement in Leeds and joined the United Caribbean Association.

The 1965 Race Relations Act led her

to set up a project to look at

discrimination in employment and

housing. Evidence from the exercise

contributed to the 1968 Race

Relations Act.

In 1969 Maureen was a member of a

Leeds University Sociology group which

investigated discrimination in housing.

The resulting study was published by

the Institute of Race Relations as Colour

and Rehousing (C. Duke IRR 1970).

Working with the police over a number

of years she has developed training

packages to improve relations with the

Black and Asian communities in West

Yorkshire. In 1972 she was invited to

give evidence to the Parliamentary

Select Committee on Police–Immigrant

Relationships.

From 1969 to 1976 Maureen became

an Immigration Counsellor with the UK Immigrants Advisory Service. Assisting immigrants and refugees with appeals against decisions at local tribunals, she also advised them on any difficulties they were experiencing.

When the opportunity arose in 1976 to go to Zambia as part of Britain’s Overseas Aid Programme Maureen and her husband Paul were enthusiastic. He helped to organise medical supplies and the training of pharmacists in rural areas.

The couple moved to Lusaka and Maureen was encouraged to develop and present radio broadcasts on African history through the Continuing Education department of the University of Zambia in 1980.

They returned to Leeds in 1981 and she resumed her membership of UCA. With African–Caribbean colleagues she renewed her training commitment with West Yorkshire Police and the Prison Service.

In the 1990s there was concern that children from ethnic minority backgrounds were being under-educated. Afro-Caribbean boys were five times as likely as white boys to be excluded from school. In 1998 Maureen published, on behalf of the Race Equality Council (REC), the first comprehensive report on minority ethnic pupils’ attainment and exclusion in Leeds, ‘On the Margin’.

In 1999 and 2000 she was the main force behind the establishment of the Stephen Lawrence Education Award. Today, at the age of seventy-five, she is still working with community organizations in Leeds, providing advice and guidance. Maureen received a well-deserved MBE in 2004.

Maureen Baker

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Shared visionNews magazine of the Stephen Lawrence Education Standard in Leeds

I took up post with Leeds City Council’s

Education Department in May 2000,

the year of the first Award in October

that year, and was impressed by the

vision and leadership of the community

representatives on the Race Equality

Advisory Forum and the senior race equality officers from the Council’s Equality Team, namely Arfan Hanif and Khizar Hayat.

I was keen that we moved away from a competitive award, which involved

much time and energy seeking sponsorship and prize money for the winning schools.

The Standard now provides a powerful framework for continuous school improvement, with evidence based on school self evaluation and focused on outcomes for children and young people as well as adults in school, and I feel privileged to have led its development.

The Leeds Stephen Lawrence Education Partnership continues to disseminate best practice through Power to Change conferences, training sessions, guidance and publications.

It is heartening that its founding members have continued with their commitment and that they are involved every year in assessing portfolios of evidence from schools.

Rehana Minhas

Kash Rafiq, the lead practitioner at Intake High school, worked on a day’s secondment to support schools to understand the expectations of the criteria for the Standard.

The Standard’s promotional DVD captures the impact of the work at Intake on raising aspirations and achievement and dealing effectively with incidents of racism. It was not a complete surprise when an Intake student, Lladel Bryant, became the UK Young Citizen of the Year in 2006.

The Macpherson report of February 1999 is seen by many as a defining moment in British race relations. The report by Sir William Macpherson followed an inquiry into the Metropolitan Police’s investigation of the murder of Stephen Lawrence. The 18-year-old A-Level student was stabbed to death in an unprovoked racist attack as he waited for a bus in Eltham, south London, in April 1993.

The report delivered a damning assessment of the “institutional racism” within the Metropolitan Police and policing generally. It made seventy recommendations, many aimed specifically at improving police attitudes to racism, and stressed the importance of a rapid increase in the numbers of black and Asian police officers.

Three of the recommendations relate specifically to education:

Recommendation 67

That consideration be given to the amendment of the national curriculum aimed at valuing cultural and faith diversity and preventing racism, in order to better reflect the needs of a diverse society.

Recommendation 68

That local education authorities and school governors have the duty to create and implement strategies in their school to prevent and address all forms of racism.

Recommendation 69

That Ofsted inspections include an examination of the implementation of such strategies.

For summaries of the Macpherson Report and The Stephen Lawrence Inquiry of 1999, visit the links at ‘About Stephen Lawrence’ on our website at www.educationleeds.co.uk/sles

Rehana Minhas

Macpherson


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This is the competition theme for 2010.

Leeds Library Service and Leeds Peace Poetry are working together to provide poetry workshops to a range of communities in Leeds, including schools, community groups, ethnic minorities and the mentally and physically challenged.

Led by professional poets, writers, playwrights and librarians, the workshops have taken place at different libraries and venues across the city.

Through writing poetry and exploring the theme, the participants have learned new skills and gained confidence.

The groups have produced some wonderful, and in some cases, very moving work, some of which will be entered into this year’s Leeds Peace Poetry competition – the eighth. The feedback from all the workshops has been positive – to give a few examples - “I loved it”, “I feel inspired”, “Helped me overcome my anxieties and fears” and “Emotional trip through images of Peace and lots of it. Thank you”.

There are more poetry events planned for November, including a poetry sharing and celebration, poetry performances by school children and a Peace-themed art competition. (Bronwyn Brady, Development Librarian, Leeds Library Service )

Camden trailblazers“The issues of race equality and community cohesion are central to our agenda.”

These were the words of Tim Coulson, who is Assistant Director of Learning and School Effectiveness in the London Borough.

He was addressing the local delegates and the Leeds team in an introduction to the training sessions, which were part of the national roll-out.

They were also addressed by Council Leader Nasim Ali, who said, “I have a strong personal interest in today’s

programme because of my history as a Bangladeshi coming to England, going to two schools (I got one O level) and becoming involved in politics.

We are fortunate in Camden to have so many nationalities. Social cohesion and the most vulnerable will suffer as a result of the coming cuts, so we are going to have to protect as much as we can.

What you are doing in the Stephen Lawrence Education Standard is crucial

for society and community cohesion

to blossom. It will open new doors for

young people.

It is a wonderful scheme! I am

immensely proud that thirteen schools

have signed up and others are waiting

to join. We are hoping that every school

will sign up.”

The launch of the programme coincided

with a photographic exhibition about

pupils’ heritage at the German

Gymnasium in King’s Cross. This

came out of a sixteen-month project

to produce stunning images inspired

by the heritage of local pupils as well

as other world cultures, including the

Maoris of New Zealand.

Rehana Minhas said, “You are already

doing a great deal in Camden as this

amazing photographic exhibition shows.

This scheme will help you to build on

that brilliant foundation.”

Feedback from the sessions was

positive: “The Leeds trainers were

very good,” Jon Kurta from Camden’s

Improvement Service told Harmony.

“And sometimes inspiring.”

Peace and Home

Jo Davey (Secondary EMA Team), Stephen Fisher (SIP and Primary Advisor), Workneh Dechasa (Senior Refugee and Community Adviser), Denise Trickett (Leeds), Bernie Barry (Team Leader, Primary EMA), Rehana Minhas (Leeds), Maura Docherty (SIP and Primary Advisor), Alison Pyle (EMA Consultant), Gill Morris (Strategy Manager, Personal Development and Wellbeing), Jon Kurta (Primary Strategy Manager)


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Leeds actor Joe Williams reviews Ira Aldridge by Martin Hoyles, published by Hansib:

In this informative and entertaining book, we immediately discover that:

Ira Aldridge was one of the most celebrated actors of the nineteenth century. He performed in all the major towns in England, Ireland, Scotland and Wales, and he won international fame when he toured the continent of Europe, earning a dozen honours and awards, including a knighthood in Germany.

Ira was born to African American parents in 1807 New York, and was very nearly kidnapped into slavery as a child, whilst on a ship that had sailed from the ‘free’ North to the enslaved South.

Ira Aldridge was fortunate to attend an African Free School in New York. At the age of just 17 years old he sailed to England and married a Yorkshire lass, a stocking-weaver’s daughter.

Keen to become a Shakespearean actor, he set off on a very impressive theatre career. Ira Aldridge died whilst on tour in Poland, in 1867. This book will tell you most of what you need to know about the man, the actor and his times.

Hansib have published another well written and researched book, with illustrations and images to help every sort of reader. You learn about other interesting people, places and social contexts.

I enjoyed learning how Ira influenced Russian theatre – and therefore modern theatre. This is a great tribute to a great man. Ira Aldridge is still an inspiration to many all over the world today.

Thank you to Martin Hoyle and Hansib for reawakening his memory and raising his profile.

This Hertford-based company has been producing books for forty years, specializing in African, Afro-Caribbean, Indo-Caribbean, Asian and other Ethnic Minority issues and subjects.

www.hansib-books.com

Ira Aldridge in 1852. He adapted Shakespeare’s Titus Andronicus so that the character he played, Aaron the Moor, turned from a villain into a hero.

The great IraThe biography of a great actor.

Name remainsA widespread campaign to retain the name of the CLR James Library in Dalston, in the London Borough of Hackney, has succeeded.

After the Black and Ethnic Minority Arts network (BEMA) set up an online petition, support flowed in from inside and outside Hackney.

BEMA said of their campaign: “We knew we would get support – after all CLR James had an impact on every continent in the world. The fact that his name was being dropped with no consultation with the black community of Hackney or his widow was an outrage.”

The CLR James Library was named in 1984 after Cyril Lionel Robert James (1901 – 1989), the Afro-Trinidadian journalist and social theorist who spent his life campaigning against colonialism and increasing awareness of black struggles all over the world through lectures, essays and works of fiction. The Black Jacobins, by CLR James, first published in 1938, was a banned book in South Africa until the end of apartheid. It is a meticulously-researched account of Toussaint L’Ouverture and the slave uprising in Haiti at the end of the eighteenth century.


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God was smiling on usFaith schools from across Leeds joined forces in June to help each other’s efforts for the Stephen Lawrence Education Standard.

A total of two hundred and eighty

students, staff, parents and governors

from eighteen Leeds schools took part

with representatives of Education Leeds

in a service at Cardinal Heenan Catholic

High School to launch the Faith Cluster.

They were addressed by diocesan youth

chaplain Father Stephen Webb and

Rehana Minhas on the importance of

collaborative work, especially in faith

communities.

Councillor Jane Dowson, executive board

member for learning, said: “The national

recognition the Stephen Lawrence

Education Standard has received shows

the high regard it’s held in.

“It urges children and young people

to treat everyone with respect and

tolerance.”

Cathie Brown, assistant headteacher

at Cardinal Heenan, who co-ordinated

the event, told Harmony: “The Standard

enables schools to work together for a

better future.

It’s important that each individual,

no matter what background they are

from, feels valued and has a sense of

belonging in the place they live in.”

Doreen Lawrence, Stephen’s mother,

sent a message of best wishes and

solidarity for the event. This was read

out at the start of the programme by

Year 7 student Harry Wilson.

Each of the eighteen schools signed

a Cluster statement of intent, to be

displayed prominently, and two children

from each school expressed their

commitment and understanding of race

equality and community cohesion.

Students from Cardinal Heenan made

a major contribution to the event. A talented musical quintet provided a series of well-rehearsed pieces, and other students led Powerpoint displays promoting inclusion and respect for all.

The Reprographics department - through its manager Keeley Hirst - played a significant part as well, supplying very impressive posters and programmes for the visitors to take back as souvenirs.

Each school received a specially designed candle with Stephen Lawrence’s image, and at the end everyone assembled on a playing field to set balloons loose.

One of the parents present, Saadia Gamir-Shahin, commented, “What moves me most is the statement which embraced all faiths, so that it applies to everyone. It invites all the guests to


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pray in their own way: I am a Moslem.”

“God was smiling on us,” said Cathie Brown afterwards. “The sun shone, the sky was blue and we looked and felt picture-perfect for the balloon finale.

Purple and green balloons with an attached statement of our intentions were set free to the atmosphere by pupils from all schools, who watched with joy as they floated away on the summer breeze.

It was great way to end a great morning!”

Schools represented:Allerton C of E Primary School, Cardinal Heenan Catholic High School, St Anthony’s Catholic Primary School, St Benedict’s Catholic Primary School, St Phillip’s Catholic Primary School, St Francis of Assisi Catholic Primary School, St Mary’s Catholic Primary School, St Joseph’s Catholic Primary School, St Paul’s Catholic Primary School, St Augustine’s Catholic Primary School, Immaculate Heart Catholic Primary School, Holy Rosary and St Anne’s Catholic Primary School, St Nicholas’ Catholic Primary School, Corpus Christi Catholic Primary School, Holy Family Catholic Primary School, Our Lady of Good Counsel Catholic Primary School, St Urban’s Catholic Primary School, Meanwood C of E Primary School.


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Take-off!It was a joyous celebration in a brand new space.

Education Leeds10th Floor East, Merrion House,110 Merrion Centre, Leeds LS2 8DJ

0113 395 [email protected] www.educationleeds.co.uk/sles/

Har

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To develop effective leadership, and a whole school approach, which embeds race equality into the life of the school.

To make sure that the duties of the Race Relations (Amendment) Act 2000, and the duty to promote community cohesion, are fulfilled.

To examine policies and their outcome, and to guard against causing disadvantage for any section of our communities.

To acknowledge and celebrate existing good practice in promoting race equality and ethnic minority in schools.

To empower children and young people to become responsible citizens of the world.

To improve the outcomes for young people and adults in our school.

Stephen Lawrence Education Standard AIMS

The official launch of the Stephen Lawrence Standard for the Inner North West Family of Schools took place at the recently-opened Armley Sports Centre in July.

A dozen primaries were represented, along with Swallow Hill Community College and Farnley Park Maths and Computing College.

There was choral singing, dancing, music, poetry and drama in a series of

performances which proved once again how powerful the performing arts can be in delivering positive messages.

There was even a rock band, from Castleton Primary, which would undoubtedly thrive and prosper in any national talent competition.

Pupils from one school wore T shirts embellished with elaborate hand-drawn designs and words like Freedom, Peace and Harmony.

The food which was provided

included some exquisite samosas,

which were especially popular,

adding to the general feeling that it

was a very special occasion.

In a final flourish made when all

the participants had gathered

outside, after a noisy countdown,

white doves were released from a

basket, to the delight of all.

The final flourish

Harmony News Magazine

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