Racism forced my daughter to move primary schools, mum says

The number of incidents of racism or racist bullying recorded in Scotland's schools increased by 50% last year, figures obtained by BBC Scotland News reveal.

According to Freedom of Information (FoI) requests to all 32 councils there were more than 3,600 incidents last year, compared to 2,400 the year before.

Campaigners say the true figure will be far higher as councils are not complying with Scottish government guidance to log all incidents properly.

The Scottish government said one of the reasons for the increase could be improved reporting.

Ekta's daughter Anisa was only seven when she started getting taunted for the colour of her skin.

Her mother says Anisa became quiet and withdrawn at home and she could not understand what was the matter.

It was only months later that Anisa broke down in tears and alerted her mother to what was going on.

Ekta says she immediately went to the headteacher and a child was asked to apologise to her daughter.

She says the school asked her daughter to accept the apology but in the following months the bullying and racism continued.

Ekta told the BBC she offered multiple times to work with the school to help with their understanding of racism but they never took her up on those offers.

Last October, two years after the initial incident, Anisa told her mother she could no longer go to the school and she was moved.

Their experience is not an isolated one.

Figures obtained by BBC Scotland News show a large increase in incidents of racism and racist bullying recorded in schools.

Campaigners said some issues are not recorded at all and others are logged as bullying instead of racism.

In its FoI response, Highland Council itted that not all its schools were recording racist incidents on the school recording system, SEEMIS.

Research by watchdog Education Scotland also previously suggested many schools were also not using SEEMIS properly for recording bullying incidents.

Ekta told BBC News that before the incidents her daughter was "bubbly, confident and outgoing".

"When the racism began she started questioning things – why am I being told I'm different? Why am I being told the colour of my skin means people don't want to talk to me?," Ekta said.

"I don't send my child to school to be abused or be a victim of racism. I send her to school to learn and be safe."

When Ekta approached the school she says she was told they had not had to deal with racism before and were not clear how to handle it.

Ekta said a child who had made a number of racist comments was asked to apologise but the school did not seem to think wider learning was necessary.

She thinks the school failed to meet its legal and ethical duties.

For Ekta it brought back memories of the racism she faced when growing up in Bearsden, north of Glasgow, decades ago.

"I thought that 30 years down the line it would have stopped or at least that the systems would be better to address some of these things," she said.

She said she felt the school managers failed to take the issue seriously and the bullying and racism continued.

Ekta says she later found out that the school logged the incidents as bullying not racism.

She raised an official complaint with East Dunbartonshire Council, where the school is located, and received a partial apology.

But she feels they have not changed their approach, training or systems and not properly understood the problem.

She is now pursuing her claim through the Scottish Public Services Ombudsman (SPSO).

Meanwhile, her daughter is at a new primary school with a new group of friends and her mother said she is happy.

The Coalition for Racial Equality and Rights (CRER) in Scotland says statistics from other organisations including the police suggest there has been an increase in racist incidents.

But they have also found evidence that many incidents in schools are not recorded.

Last year they set up AdRESS – Advocates for Race Equality in Schools Scotland - to parents and carers who have a child going through racism at school.

Kwaku Adjei, the education advocacy officer for CRER and head advisor for AdRESS, said hate crime reports had gone up but it was also apparent from research that the true figure should be a lot higher.

"Our previous research in 2022 indicated that 85% of schools are not reporting incidences that have been reported to them," he said.

"If we're not recording them, how do we know that the incident is being dealt with in any way"Pupils in a primary school in Glasgow. Two children - a girl and a boy -have their backs to the camera. They are both wearing a red jumper and white polo shirt. They are sitting in small wooden chairs at a large desk. There is classroom activity in the front of them. " class="sc-4abb68ca-0 ldLcJe"/>