Woman's Hour - Sharon D Clarke, SEND teacher training, Black nurses in history

Episode Date: October 11, 2024

Sharon D Clarke is a triple Olivier award-winning actress currently starring in two separate TV series: My Loverman on BBC One and Ellis on Channel 5. In November she’s playing the role of Lady Bracknell in The Importance of Being Earnest at the Lyttelton Theatre in London. Sharon joins Krupa Padhy to talk about her new roles and what black representation on stage and screen means to her.Mums say that the UK’s system for children with special educational needs and disabilities (SEND) is broken. An opinion poll from Opinium commissioned by Woman's Hour for a programme on SEND last month revealed that only half of mothers believe their child with SEND is well supported in school, and those in Scotland are the least likely to feel this way. Krupa takes a look at what is going on behind the scenes with Julie Allan, Professor of Equity and Inclusion at the University of Birmingham; Bev Alderson, National Executive Member of the teaching union NASUWT and Jo Van Herwegen. Professor of Developmental Psychology and Education at University College London.The rap musician Sean ‘Diddy’ Combs could face lawsuits from more than 100 accusers for sexual assault, rape and sexual exploitation. He is currently being held in a New York detention centre after being denied bail. What are the accusations against him? And what impact is this having on the alleged victims? BBC News correspondent Chi Chi Izundu joins Krupa to tell us more.Who were the trailblazing black women in nursing and how far back does that history go? The children’s black history author Kandace Chimbiri asks that question in her latest book The Story of Britain’s Black Nurses. She examines how far back this history goes and its links to Empire and Britain’s former colonies.

This BBC podcast is supported by ads outside the UK. I'm Natalia Melman-Petrozzella, and from the BBC, this is Extreme Peak Danger. The most beautiful mountain in the world. If you die on the mountain, you stay on the mountain. This is the story of what happened when 11 climbers died on one of the world's deadliest mountains, K2. And of the risks we'll take to feel truly alive. If I tell all the details, you won't believe it anymore. Extreme. Peak danger. Listen wherever you get your podcasts.

BBC Sounds. Music, radio, podcasts. Hello, this is Krupal Bharti and you're listening to the Woman's Hour podcast. Hello and welcome to the programme on a Friday. Just before the summer, my son, then in year two, came home from school telling me all about the achievements of Mary Seacole. And what stayed with him, and I imagine will stay with him for many years to come, were those details about the lengths she had to go to to overcome racism and other challenges to practice her skills as a nurse during the war in Crimea. We know Mary Seacole is one of many thousands of black British nurses, past and present, that deserve to be celebrated by all generations. Children's author Kandasi Chimbiri is doing just that with her new book, The Story of Britain's Black Nurses, and she will

join us. We're going to pick up on the extensive response we've had following the Women's Hour special on SEND last month. We'll be talking about the subject of teacher training and whether teachers feel sufficiently equipped with the skills and resources to help children who need that extra support. As always, it's important for us to hear from you on this. If you are a parent or guardian of a child with special educational needs, are you happy with the support they are getting in the classroom? If you're a teacher or part of the school teaching community, do you feel like you're able to meet the needs of all your students to make the classroom more inclusive? And if you're a parent of a child who doesn't have special educational needs, we'd also want to hear from you about how it works in your child's classroom. You can text the programme. That number is 84844.

Text will be charged at your standard message rate. Over on social media, that's X and Instagram. We're at BBC Women's Hour. And of course, you can email us through our website, or you can send us a WhatsApp message or audio note using the number 03700 100 444. All of our terms and conditions can be found on our website. We're also going to be talking to the actor Sharon D. Clarke about the catalogue of different roles she's taken on recently. She's appearing in Mr. Loverman, a BBC adaptation of Bernardine Evaristo's novel, as well as Ellis, a Channel 5 crime drama. So do stay with us for that.

But we are going to start in the US where Sean Diddy Combs, the rapper and record producer who became famous worldwide in the 1990s. He is making headlines. You might know him for his hits like I'll Be Missing You. And he's also gone by the names of Puff, Puff Daddy and P. Diddy. He became one of the most successful rap artists in U.S. history, with his wealth estimated at $1 billion back in 2022. However, after a year of public allegations of sexual misconduct and media speculation about his private life, Sean Combs was arrested on the 16th of September

and arraigned on sex trafficking, racketeering and transportation to engage in prostitution charges. His lawyer, said the rapper, emphatically and categorically denied the allegations, saying they were false and defamatory. He's been remanded in the special housing unit at Brooklyn's Metropolitan Detention Centre since then. And yesterday, the judge presiding over the case decided the trial will begin on the 5th of May next year and stated that Combs will remain in custody. There is lots to talk through with the BBC's Chi-Chi Izundu here to tell us more.

Thanks for being with us, Chi-Chi. Talk us through what more we know about what happened at that pre-trial hearing yesterday. So what we know is that there was a lot of legal argument that occurred. But essentially, like you said, the crux of the conversations that were had is that he will begin his trial on the 5th of May 2025. And this is the criminal proceedings because he has a lot of civil action as well against him. But for the criminal proceedings, effectively, that will start on the 5th of May next year. So the 5th of May, a big date for him. What might we expect to hear at that trial? So far, the trials have been open to the media and the public. At the

trial yesterday, a number of his fans turned up. He was supported by members of his family. Our colleagues who attended the court case said that he mouthed the words, I love you to his family, including six of his children who were in court as well. He made a lot of gestures of hand prayers and putting his hand over his heart. Next year, we'll get more detail about the accusations that are lobbied against him. They include racketeering, kidnapping, drugging and coercing women into sexual activities, sometimes with a firearm and threatening them with violence. So we should hear more detail about what's happened. Just to take you back, Sean Diddy Coombs is an absolutely global star. If people can remember back as far back as the early 2000s, there was two camps of music,

particularly in the UK, you were either into Take That and Oasis or Blur. Or if you're a bit like me, you were into R&B and hip hop. Now, Sean Diddy Coombs was a producer at that time and he had his Bad Boy records. It was a huge phenomenal change that he implemented into that music space with R&B and hip hop because he kind of fused R&B, hip hop and pop together. So you'd have rap artists appearing on pop songs like with Mariah Carey, or you'd have rap artists appearing on pop songs, like with Mariah Carey, or you'd have singers like JLo appearing on hip hop tracks that hadn't really been done before. And he changed the game. He had a particular sound, and people absolutely loved it. He made huge waves in the music industry. He started his own clothing line. At one point, he had his own alcohol. He was a billionaire working in a very, very restricted space. So he made his name that

way. Carved his territory. And this scandal started last year when his ex-partner, Cassie Ventura, filed sexual assault charges against him. They were settled out of court. But what happened as a result of the coverage of this case? So that was settled the day after it was filed and as a result more and more people have come forward. As I said this is the criminal case that will start on the 5th of May 2025 but he has a numerous quite a long length of civil cases accusing him of a variety of different crimes, including sexual assault, sexual exploitation and rape. Just at the start of this month, another lawyer based in Texas came forward and said he had more than 100 different clients wanting to take legal action against Sean Diddy Coombs for those various charges. We're still waiting to find out more detail exactly on that. There is

apparently videotape that might be seen or shown in court or revealed to the public. One of the things that Sean's team are arguing is they do not want any of that to come up before the trial because they believe that will taint any kind of jury that may be part of the trial. You mentioned videos there because earlier this year a video did emerge of him violently assaulting Cassie Ventura, that's his ex-partner. He issued a public apology but what impact did that have? It had quite an impact because again I'll take you a step back. So when Cassie originally filed her legal motion as always these days on social media you had people who believed her and

people who didn't. She didn't say anything. He categorically denied that he had been violent towards her. But like I said, a day later, they settled that case for an undisclosed amount out of court. Then CNN managed to get hold of this video showing him being physically abusive. He then went on Instagram and apologised saying he was disgusted when he was doing that. But it led a lot of other people to come out and come forward and say, I'm going to take legal action because I believe this has happened to me as well. So his lawyers are saying that or accused the government of leaking that video and saying that they did that to taint any kind of criminal proceedings. The government have, the US government have denied that they did that and that CNN got obtained that video through their own sources and means. But people are watching because he is not he's a pivotal person not just in black music

but in music in general cassie was his girlfriend for more than a decade but she was also an artist in her own right p diddy went out with jlo for quite a long time he's had quite a few famous girlfriends he's created the careers of many people in music that we know today and love so everyone's eyes will be on this case because it is a huge thing in black music he's not a small person can i ask you specifically about what we know about these sex trafficking charges the sex trafficking charges we don't know that much. There was a document that was unsealed, which revealed that some of his accusers had said they had been trafficked across state lines. And also that the authorities had managed to find more than a thousand bottles of baby oil. People might have seen that there has been a lot of jokes,

memes, commentary on baby oil on social media. That would be why. And that these bottles of baby oils were used in sexual orgies, which he called freak-offs. And Cassie had mentioned in her lawsuit as well. We are expecting much more detail in the court case because the feds that US agents that actually raided his homes in the States can reveal more of what they have, including some of the videos that Cassie claimed he had shot as part of these orgies. I also want to talk about the timing of all of this, because in a press conference last

week, a Texas-based attorney, Tony Busby, said that he was representing 120 accusers with claims going back to 1991. And he claims that the alleged victims included 60 men and 60 women. And whilst 25 were minors at the time of the alleged misconduct, this alleged abuse is on a huge scale, said to go back 30 years, yet details are only emerging now. So this is a problem in music in general. And this is a problem, particularly in black music. People don't talk. People will not talk. There is a unquestionable loyalty in that space, because it's such a coveted space.

Everyone knows everyone. Everyone knows everyone's business, but they won't talk or speak out. It takes a lot of courage in the black music industry to speak out. I've done a number of stories like this one where it's really hard to get anyone to come forward on the record and talk about their experiences because they're

so scared they'll be blacklisted. And would you say this is specific to the black music community, this loyalty that you talk about? No, it is the music industry full stop. It's actually quite a small industry, even though we get hit after hit and it is huge. But if you think about it, there's only a few record labels, successful record labels, and everyone moves in between them. And it is a small space. People use the same producers. People use the same sound rigors.

People use the same vocalists. It is a really intimate space, and it's not just black music. It's music in general. And linked to that, there have been other celebrity names popping up in all of this as well. Indeed, there have been other celebrity names. But what we must be is very careful because nothing official has come out on those celebrity names. And in fact, one broadcaster had to issue a public apology just the other day for having somebody mention other celebrity names in a broadcast regarding this story. The issue is, is that people believe that P. Diddy used to throw massive parties.

He was connected to huge artists all over the world. And he used to throw what he called white parties every year. It was the place, the thing, the party to be seen at. Everyone had to come dressed in white. And then you just have an amazing time. Sometimes they were at his homes in the United States. Sometimes they were at a boat moored off Ibiza. Sometimes they were in an undisclosed hotel somewhere.

But everyone, every celebrity and everyone in every industry wanted to be at those parties. He had connections to absolutely everything. Every celebrity and everyone in every industry wanted to be at those parties. He had connections to absolutely everything and he was a billionaire. But now there is worry and fear, according to the lawyer that you just mentioned, based in Texas, that names are going to come out as a result of attending some of those parties and potentially what happened in some of those parties that we have not yet been made privy to. Just before I let you go, you mentioned loyalty and just what a big name he is and just how important he is to music and to black music specifically. How has this impacted his fan base?

Because some data suggests that streams of his music has actually gone up. Well, this happened with R. Kelly, sadly. Despite the allegations, the charges, his jail time, every time he reappeared in the media, his sales for his streams went up because people, okay, let me put it this way. When it comes to allegations against men, particularly in black music, men in that space never speak up against the men accused. If you notice, there is quite often a silence from men in also the public want to be reminded of the talent which a lot of these artists had which made them famous in the first place as one thing you cannot take away from these artists they are incredibly talented people and they did incredibly talented things. But at the same time, they used that talent, like R. Kelly, and that power to do depraved and horrific things to other people. But he's still a talented artist.

And unfortunately, sometimes when their name is in the media and people can't remember who they are, what songs they did and why they became famous. Their streams go up. Yes. And we see that time and time again. Chi Chi Azundu, thank you so much for joining us. A really interesting story of which more details will emerge in the coming weeks and months. Thank you. Next, Sharon D. Clarke is a three-time Olivia Award winning actress who you might know best from Holby City, where she played Lola Griffin. In her career so far she's done everything from the pantomime at the Hackney Empire to the vocals on a song that reached number two in the charts I Want to Give You Devotion by the Nomads. Now she's appearing in Mr Loverman a BBC adaptation of Bernadine Evaristo's novel of the same name. Alongside that you'll also be able to see Sharon in Ellis, a Channel 5 crime drama. And because that's just not enough to have going on for one woman,

Sharon is also currently in rehearsals for The Importance of Being Earnest, which is on at the Lyttelton at the National Theatre next month. And Sharon joins me now. Welcome. Good morning. Good morning. Good to have you with us. Pleasure to be here, my darling. Let's start with Ellis. You play DCI Ellis. Tell us more about her. DCI Ellis is a Londoner who is parachuted into the rural community in the Peak District to solve cases that haven't been quite solved yet. So she's like a troubleshooter. And the thing about her is the fact that she's always going into these different police stations and having to deal with how she is seen or underestimated or simply resented because the fact that she's there means that people aren't doing their jobs. And so she's coming up and roughing up and ruffling against and just mashing up the status quo in a way,

do you know what I mean, in her own understated way. And that's the key word, understated, because it's not all about the words, it's about the look, it's about the body language. And as our listeners can hear, you have such a softness in your voice, yet you come across as extremely powerful, both in person and in the work that you do. I wonder where that power comes from. my family seeing those women with their strength and their dignity and their their vigor and their vibrancy and just being these glorious women who could take on everything that society was throwing at them and bring us up to hold our heads up tall and be proud in who we are so it all it all stems from that. I know that before you started filming,

Ellis, you spoke to Irene Afful, who was the first black woman detective inspector for Merseyside Police. What was that like speaking to her? Just an honour and a privilege to be talking to this woman who is a trailblazer. She was the first in Merseyside, Black DCI. And you just go, what she went through, her trials and tribulations, her support, the people who championed her, the people who didn't want her to be there, working in an institutionally racist organisation, but standing through that, standing tall, standing firm and showing her worth and doing all of that with dignity and rising through the ranks even though some people

were going to object to her rising through the ranks. She did it. She did it. I knew nothing about her. So for me to know that these, you know that they're out there but we're not taught it in schools, we're not taught it anywhere. So to know that this woman was out there just doing her thing up in Merseyside, breaking down, crashing through glass ceilings, crashing through barriers and standing firm, such an inspiration to get to talk to her and try and capture her essence and her dignity in Ellis.

And obviously her experiences, although Merseyside Police have not specifically been found to be institutionally racist in any way but her experiences have clearly informed your performance which was so authentic and this performance in particular you have spoken about this being the first black woman-led UK TV series and I know representation is very important to you. Do you think it's moving quickly enough? It's moving, but it's 2024. And here I am in 2024, the first black woman to be playing the title role in a show. It's 2024. So yeah, we're moving forward, but we still have a lot of work to do. You know, someone said it was incredibly refreshing

to see something like this. That's a lovely thing to hear, but it shouldn't be incredibly refreshing in 2024 to see a black woman leading a show and having the title role. And that's the thing, I've not seen someone in the title role, and that's very important for me. Had I seen something like that when I was growing up, you've got to see it to be it.

Do you know what I mean? As much imagination as you can do, but when you've grown up in a society where you've not seen yourself reflected on the television, you've not seen your friends or the culture that you grew up in reflected. I mean, I say to people, I grew up in a very multicultural society,

but I didn't see that reflected on my television when I was growing up. Whereas when I went to the States, the States is somewhere that I could watch the television and see all to this country, black, brown, yellow, white. Do you know what I mean? How it's made, particularly London, such a rich, rich place. The other thing you've spoken about extensively, connected to what you're saying, is the fact that you didn't go to any formal acting school. You didn't have any connections. You didn't come from money.

No, no, but I'm still here. I went to Anna Shares, who was an English teacher who started an improvisation club after school, literally to get kids off the streets. And Anna tends to have those more rorer East End actors,

people like Natalie Cassidy and Gillian Telforth, Kathy Burke, who's one of my compatriots. And it's, we can do it. I've had someone ask me, how can I have the career that I have having not gone to drama school? I'm good at what I do.

And if people think out of the box and look elsewhere and see that there is talent elsewhere, then hopefully we work and we continue working and we can be role models. Let's talk about Mr. Loverman, which you are starring in alongside Lenny James on the BBC. Tell us a bit more about the series based on the Antiguan community in North London. Well, it's Bernardine Averisto's prize winning book, Mr. Loverman. Lenny James, the incomparable, wonderful, glorious man that is Lenny James, plays Barrington Jedediah Walker, who is a elder Caribbean man who is gay,

who has been in a relationship with his best friend, Morris, for over 50 years. And it's their journey, how they have lived their life, how they've had to hide, how they've had to live in secret. I play Carmel, his wife, and she has her own journey as well through the story. For me, having a story about gay, elder Caribbean love is not something that I have ever seen on my screen. It's not something that's dealt with well in my Caribbean community or the African community or in society in general I mean now we have a generation of children of who for them would be like yes old gay people so what but the journey to get there in that way and the fight

and the shame and the betrayal and having to hide your life is not something that I've seen from our community. So I'm really proud to be a part of this project. And that must have come with a sense of great responsibility as well. Great responsibility and also great pride, wanting to do justice to the story. And yes, there is a responsibility, but having that story out there, being able to tell it, is so much more than feeling any responsibility for it. Bernadine's book is so sweeping and honest and brutally honest and painful and joyful and uplifting. And if we honour the book, then the responsibility is not there, the joy is there, the upliftment is there.

And it's... I'm so proud and it's I'm so proud of it I'm so proud of and you do a tremendous job having seen some of it um it is such a moving portrayal of what is such an important story your parents were part of the Windrush generation this was very close to home for you though yeah very close to home for me I wanted them honored in that way my parents would not have seen themselves on television in that way. I think the last thing that I can remember was something like Empire Road when we had a proper drama. And that, I mean, I was a kid. And it's been too long. It's been too long. So for me, it's really important that these stories are out there. And, you know, my mum and dad aren't with us anymore,

but hopefully they're looking down and they're going, yes, we see it happening and it's a beautiful, beautiful thing. Makes me very proud, makes me very, very happy. And you mentioned Carmel, who sometimes doesn't say much. She's a sort of a silent sufferer in some ways, but in many ways, and I might be mistaken, but seems to represent a generation of extremely stoic women. Yeah, totally. Absolutely. And if you see that, I'm doing my job. I want people to see how these women stand with dignity.

And sometimes they have to bite their tongue and hold things back. Sometimes they're able to speak their truth but they always do it with dignity and would you say that's typical of a generation just women having to suffer in silence you know it you know from your generation as well absolutely you know it's the it's the same journey we might be on different paths we might be coming from different countries but the journey is the same and how important do you think it is for people from other cultures to understand those struggles education is key education is key to know that we are more different more more alike than we are different and also to learn about the people

around you you know i mean what is we should be tapping into all of humanity where we can do you know i mean we learn from each other daily. What the mixing of cultures has done in London, for a start, is so enriching that we should be looking to see how our neighbours live and how we can live together. So I want to tap into all of the stuff that's out there. I don't want to just sit down and watch stuff that's just about my community. Do you mean I live in my community? I know that the world is supposed to expand. And television and film does that. It can educate you, it can elevate a situation, it can inspire people when they've seen something that they've never seen before, to get them to do something that they've never done before. And it can educate, it should do that. And it should spark

debate as well. You know, I did a play called Caroline All Change, which is all about a black maid working with a Jewish family in Louisiana in the 60s. And we had a lawyer come along who saw that and he used to work in corporate law and after seeing caroline or change he changed his remit to social justice and i think if if the art can do that that it can make someone go how can i make a difference how can i add to the richness of life in that way that's why i do what i do so we should all be watching each other's stories and finding out that actually, if you look at stories from most cultures, they will intertwine and overlap because the human experience is the human experience. As if you're not busy enough. You are also in rehearsals at the moment for The Importance of Being Earnest, one of Oscar Wilde's most famous plays. That too is a very diverse cast. Yes, and I'm loving that.

We are doing Oscar Wilde as Oscar Wilde would have written it today if he was living in London, multiculturally. And for me, that is so important. You know, I think audiences have seen the likes of Bridgerton now and are kind of getting a bit more used to seeing black and brown people in period costume. And so let's open it up. Let's open up the imagination

and have the world that we live in diverse and multicultural. And I'm really excited to be a part of that cast, working with the beautiful Shuti Gatwar, our wonderful cast, Hugh Skinner, Richard Kant, Ronke. I'm not going to remember.

The list goes on. The list goes on. And we're having a lot of fun in rehearsals going through the text. And talking about your character in period costumes, you're playing Lady Bracknell. And I don't want to give away any spoilers, but just tell us a bit more about how you're going about playing her. Well, she's this, people know of Lady Bracknell.

She's this gorgon of a woman, this monster, this, she's no, she's a stranger to self-doubt. She's a woman who stands very strong in who she is, who her beliefs, what her beliefs are, rightly or wrongly, she will always abide by them. She's just a strong kick-ass woman. And I love that about her. She's fearless, fearless and fearful. She makes people fearful. And it's going to be an absolute joy to play

in a comedy. I've done these run of shows that have been very deep and emotional and angst-ridden. And it's just lovely to be mad and silly and brash and and broad-stroked and and funny and this mad woman who's gonna be an absolute joy to play and she's got that famous line a handbag any idea of how you're going to say the line people keep asking me that I am learning my lines at the moment so I don't know my lines I have no idea how I'm gonna say it I've got a whole show to learn I can't be concentrating on two letters, two words. There is so much emphasis on those two words. I know.

Before I let you go, I do want to mention the fact that you are a trained social worker. And I wonder how that informs what you do, because what I have seen from all of your performances is authenticity and versatility. You move seamlessly from character to character and you're so believable on screen how much does your kind of past life working in social care inform that I think that kind of just informs everything I do without me even thinking about it I love people yeah um had I not become an actor I would have continued in social work because I love being with people I love helping people I'm the kind of kid that was in school and having girls coming to me in the toilet and say I'm dying and I'd be like no it's just your period I can't believe

no one's talked to you about this um my brother my brother from another mother has a name for me Kimberly Clark and Kimberly Clark was like the person that you used to see on the toilet rolls and stuff in the ladies. And that's my kind of social work persona. That is a part of me that will always be a part of me. And so will inform everything that I do. Such a pleasure talking to you. An absolute joy talking to you this morning.

Thank you. Sharon D. Clark there. Mr. Loverman is on the BBC from 9pm on Monday evening. I can't wait to see this morning. Thank you. Sharon D. Clark there. Mr. Loverman is on the BBC from 9pm on Monday evening. I can't wait to see it all. And Ellis will be on Channel 5 later this month. The Importance of Being Earnest will run from the 21st of November at the Lyttelton Theatre. I'm Sarah Trelevan, and for over a year, I've been working on one of the most complex stories I've ever covered. There was somebody out there who was faking pregnancies. I started like warning everybody.

Every doula that I know. It was fake. No pregnancy. And the deeper I dig, the more questions I unearth. How long has she been doing this? What does she have to gain from this? From CBC and the BBC World Service, The Con, Caitlin's Baby. It's a long story, settle in.

Available now. To have you with us. Thank you to the many of you who are getting in touch on special educational needs. That is what we turn our attention to now, because if you were listening last month to the edition of Women's Hour dedicated to the topic of SEND you will have heard how many parents of children with special educational needs and disabilities have been contacting this program to say that the UK SEND system is broken. An opinion poll commissioned by Women's Hour revealed that only half of mothers believe their child with SEND is well supported in school and those in Scotland are least likely to feel this way. Now just to be clear about the language here which is so important SEND stands for

Children with Special Educational Needs and Disabilities in England. In Scotland the system is called ASN which is Additional Support Needs and in Wales it's ALN which is additional learning needs and in Northern Ireland it is known as the SEND register that is the special educational needs register. Joining the SEND program as a panel guest was Catherine McKinnell Minister for School Standards and here she is explaining how the government thinks that children with SEND should be at the heart of the educational system and some changes they are promising. We're rolling out actually next month a training tool for those people that work in early years so that they can spot the signs of a special educational need or disability and they are better trained and better supported

and fundamentally as well we want to see more staff in our schools. That's why we are pledging to put 6,500 more teachers in our schools, because we recognise that if schools are going to achieve that inclusivity that we really want to see, they need the support staff, they need the teachers to be trained, they need a cohort of school staff

that can really meet that need as well. Catherine McKinnell there, Minister for School Standards. Let's get into this now, because this morning we are going to take a look at what is going on behind the scenes in the classroom and focus on the training and the tools of the teachers and other staff who work with children with SEND. I am joined by Jo van Hervegan, Professor of Developmental Psychology and Education at the University College London. Bev Alderson, National Executive Member of the Teaching Union NASUWT. And Julie Allen, Professor of Equity and Inclusion at the University of Birmingham. Welcome to you all.

Julie, I will start with you. Let's start with the teacher side of things. What training do teachers get to work with children who have special educational needs and disabilities? Good morning, Krupa. And the teachers who are looking to gain qualified teacher status will either do an undergraduate degree or a postgraduate certificate in education a PGCE and they'll either do that at a university or in England they'll perhaps join a school-based teacher training program and most providers will offer inclusion and send as both a discrete part within that program, within that training program, and it'll be embedded within the main teaching training program. At the University of Birmingham, example inclusion is a discrete mandatory module within the primary

programme but it's also infused throughout so the teachers are learning the student teachers are learning about the curriculum and how to adapt it for students with SEND. So that's for teachers or that's for people who are formally training to be teachers. But what strikes me just from my own children's experience in schools is that when it comes to managing the needs of children, these specific needs of children, it's not just the teachers who are having to face that. We're talking about teaching assistants, but also people who work in the dining hall, for example. I wonder what support is available to them in a formal framework. Absolutely. And teaching assistants are really important in the whole send and inclusion piece. They can make or break inclusion.

There is training available for teaching assistants. There are level two qualifications and there's a new qualification coming on stream available next year specifically for teaching assistants. But the reality is these teaching assistants are appointed to meet immediate needs and training is often a luxury. That said, most schools will offer training to all staff, teaching assistants, the dinner ladies and teachers. And that would be delivered by the SENCO, the Special Educational Needs Coordinator, also a very important person in the send piece let me bring in a few of the messages that we've had this one says i trained as a teacher in 2018 there was

no training on how to teach and plan for send children since qualifying i worked as a supply and you are regularly sent to cover special teaching facility classes where i feel so out of my depth as it's not fair on the pupils to not be receiving education from an experienced SEND teacher. And this from a parent who writes, I have a daughter who has just this year completed her primary school training

and she feels like it is not an area she wants to continue in. One of the big issues is that there is a number of children in her class who have special needs, but there is not the support staff to help them in the classroom. There are classes of 30 children and many of these children have missed out because of the COVID epidemic, which I suspect contributes to their

difficulties. One child has a support worker who works for half a day, four days a week, but is often called out to other classrooms to help. So highlighting some of the challenges there. Bev, let me bring you into the conversation. What do you hear from teachers about teaching children with special educational needs and disabilities in the classroom? And a few examples there from our listeners. Yeah, so some of the points that Julie made, my members are telling me that the training that they receive in universities

and then in their early years career so they're supposed to be mentored for the first two years of teaching is very very limited and Julie did mention adapting the curriculum and that is really probably as far as training goes in terms of new teachers and that does not cover all the needs that the teacher is going to face in the classroom um i think not all universities offer the same sort of training as well and julie did mention school-based um training for teachers and that is where the issue really lies because julie mentioned that the senco should be training new staff and new support staff but the SENCOs now are just not able to do that job because they're swamped by paperwork, they're covering too many roles,

they're usually the safeguarding lead, the child protection lead and they have so much paperwork which is statutory to fulfill that their time is limited in terms of supporting any teachers or TAs. And a real crux of the situation is that TAs have been made redundant in many schools because of budget cuts. Schools cannot afford to keep TAs and they're the first people to go. And when there is an immediate need and a child comes in who does need a TA trying to recruit somebody these days is is impossible because the pay is low the job is difficult the training is virtually non-existent and it's a really tricky job and and to be frank TAs can earn more in

working in little and older than they work doing that really difficult job. In terms of, I think one of the other issues is, well, I've mentioned the workload associated with SEND, and that goes down to the class teachers, because the SENCO just doesn't have the time to do it. And what should be happening is the SENCO should be working alongside teachers in the classroom because they probably have had training and they're you know they've built up experience and skills but they just don't have the time to get into the classrooms to support and the other lack of training comes from the fact that when a child has SEND and they have an EHCP, it's supposed to be a multi-agency support for that

child. So people like speech therapists, educational psychologists, CAMHS, are supposed to support that child and be a team around the child and often we're not seeing that happening because there are no ed psychs available cams has got waiting lists of up to two years speech we just can't find them and those people used to come in and deliver training into schools when local authorities had teams of those people that's where the training came from and those services are just not there anymore so what I'm hearing from you loud and clear is that budget issues are there, resources are limited, time is limited. And that is what a Sarah in Stockport has got in touch to also say. I'm a science secondary teacher.

I've taught at my most recent school for three years. Out of approximately 35 groups I've taught in the last three years, I've had only two with learning support assistance. I definitely do not provide the support needed to the many, many students I teach with SEND needs. My understanding is that budget cuts are the reason my school can't afford to employ enough learning support assistance. So we've highlighted there what is going wrong, what we need and what is going wrong. Julie, the UK aside, which countries are getting it right? Who can we look to for a model that actually works? In most of the rest of Europe, teachers are trained to master's level.

And that's so much better because it simply gives more time to engage with issues like SEND and inclusion. These teachers come out and they've had a lot of time to think about and understand SEND and inclusion. We're trying to squeeze SEND and inclusion into a one-year postgraduate certificate in education and it was simply too difficult. So these countries in Europe do a lot better. There have been some instances in the UK, in Edinburgh for example, of trying to introduce a master's level qualification and that seems to have worked really well. Edinburgh runs a Masters in transformative learning and I actually looked at that and spoke to some of the students who felt more equipped, more capable at engaging with the whole range of diversity, including social disadvantage and the local authorities employing these teachers felt that the teachers were much better, much more capable and competent. Well, let's look, let's look towards solutions here.

And let me bring in Jo van Herwegen from University College London. Welcome to Women's hour joe um listening there to julie and bev highlighting the dilemmas the many dilemmas facing teachers there the challenges i mean how can send teaching be improved in your opinion practically speaking yeah yeah a lot of the issues who resonate which are what we've heard from in our research listening to teachers and there's a number of things i think that can be done. First of all you know creating toolkits trusted toolkits for teachers that they can access. Problem is we want teachers to use evidence-informed practice or research-informed practice but that means they

need to have access to research. They don't have the time to go and read articles etc so it's about providing them with the tools the latest research about what works in a classroom for the students with SENS, what doesn't work in a classroom. Research has moved on. And so we've created a toolkit called MetaSense. It's a database that teachers can access around what interventions have been shown to work in research and which interventions haven't for particular groups. It's free to use. It's co-produced with teachers, for teachers.

It's a starting point. I know we're not the only ones. There are other toolkits. But I think it's important that we start to highlight these toolkits so that we can support teachers as much as we can, not expecting them to do a lot of research. I think the other point that has been raised here as well by Julie and by Bev is the fact that looking again

at that initial teacher training, and I think what is happening in a lot of European countries is not only that they're being educated to a master's level, but that they also have more knowledge around child development. And that means that they can better understand why a child might have difficulties with for example mathematics for very different reasons and therefore start to understand what might work better for certain children compared to other children and so that teachers are incredibly creative problem solvers but you need to understand the problem first before you can solve it and it's kind of giving them the tools to do

that that is required let me just pause you there and bring this message in from allison because it's related to what you've been saying um i'm a retired teacher current school governor and a grandmother to a child with autism from my experience the biggest gap in training is at preschool level some preschool SENCOs are brilliant but a lot aren't the earlier children are identified as having extra needs the better their chances in life also councils need to process applications for extra funding far quicker than they do now because that's a that's a good point from Alison it's not just about the school it's not just about the classroom it's about all of these pieces of the web, I imagine, coming together. Absolutely. And this is where I think a third solution is required is kind of having more short courses outside of teacher training that allow not only teachers, but the TAs we've been talking about, also the SENCOs, also the other people involved, and sometimes

that is still professionals, educational psychologists, through, for example, short courses that can be done online at their own pace when they are free. And they can be provided in a very cheap and effective way, really, to upskill people. And I don't think they've been utilised a lot and actually this is where the government could make a change by for example making some of their training maybe mandatory within EHCPs to making sure that when staff are working with a child with special educational needs and disabilities they are required to have a couple of minimal criteria or at least have looked at the video or a handbook

or a toolkit to help support students with special educational needs in the classroom. This message has just come in. I've been a TA for 20 years and in mainstream school with zero send training. I've been hit, pinched, screamed at, etc. Absolutely not the child's fault, but goodness, it is difficult. Bev, let me bring you back in here. I wonder to what extent you feel there is a role for the parents community here to support teaching staff, because clearly the subject of funding and resources is one that needs to be addressed. But there isn't an immediate solution because when it comes to the parent community, isn't lived experience so important

for informing practice? It really is and you know all teachers want to do the best for their pupils and really sympathise and empathise with the parents and you know parental pressure is becoming quite a forceful issue because my members are telling me that some parents are suing the school or the head teacher because EHCPs have got really specific targets to be met and because of limited resources schools are struggling to meet them and so parents are quite rightly fighting for their children but actually putting more pressure on schools. And thinking going back to local authorities, they have a statutory legal responsibility for SEND. And let's remember that some of these authorities are bankrupt, or they have such huge deficits.

So what they're doing, they're trying to delay having any new EHCPs because they can't fund them because as soon as an EHCP is granted there's got to be some funding from the local authority never enough to cover a teaching assistant I hasten to add and and so parents are feeling really frustrated even before their children get any sort of you know extra support or are identified as needing an EHCP and just going back to the toolkits that Jo mentioned that's one of the government initiatives that's been discussed as well for early years but these toolkits will need TAs to deliver them because the pressures on teachers they're accountable for getting results and through testing and exams and so extra you know interventions that will be expressed the young children so more pressure on tas there and

thank you to all of you there that's joe van her vegan from university college london bev alderson the a national executive member of the teaching union NASUWT and Julie Allen from the University of Birmingham there. A Department for Education spokesperson said for too long, children and young people with SEND have been let down by a system that is not working. But this government is determined to deliver change. Urgent work is already underway to ensure more children are getting earlier and better support to thrive in education through our curriculum and assessment review. Ofsted reforms a new early year SEND training. We'll end on a positive from Joanne who says, I've had a positive experience so far with the SEND system. My granddaughter started primary school last month and has already had her needs identified and an appointment arranged with an educational psychologist.

Thank you for your message there, Joanne, and to all of you getting in touch on this important subject. Many of us will know that the history of the NHS is intricately linked to the efforts of the Windrush generation. Thousands of people arrived from the Caribbean between 1948 and 1973 and they were crucial to the rebuilding of Britain after the Second World War. Today, black and minority ethnic staff make up more than a quarter of the NHS workforce and more than a third of nurses, midwives and health visitors, according to the 2023 Workforce Race

Equality Standard. But the story of how black nurses shaped and influenced Britain goes far deeper than post-war Britain. This is the subject of Candessie Chimbiri's latest book on black history for children. It's called The Story of Britain's Black Nurses, and it celebrates trailblazing black women in nursing. And she joins me now. Good to have you with us, Candessie. Good to be here. The modern story of Britain's black nurses is, of course, linked to Britain's empire. But your book highlights that this goes back much, much further. How far back does it go?

Well, it goes back to Africa. So before colonisation, before empire. And we don't really know a lot, but I felt what we did find was important to highlight in the book so that we can understand that nurses have a legacy, they have a long history. So going back to, for example, the days of enslavement, we actually find records in Britain about people being kept on the coast of Africa to help nurse the enslavers and to nurse people that were being sent over to the Caribbean and the other parts of the new world, as it was called. So it goes back. But even before that, we know that there's history prior to that, although it's very difficult to find the nursing. But we know that

people have for thousands of years cared for other people when they were poorly. Tell us about some of the stories that you found, the story of Nurse Flora in Jamaica, for example, that stood out. Nurse Flora, we have a picture of her. So that was why she was so important for me to include in the book. But the frustrating thing is we don't know a lot about these women. We don't know about their lives. We don't know very much about what they thought. We don't even know much about the methods that they used to nurse. We only get glimpses of them because Nurse Flora, she actually helped the wife of the governor of Jamaica at the time. This was in 1801 to 1805, Lady Nugent. And she helped her to give birth to her first son. She was actually called

in to do this. And that's why she's mentioned. But that's all. We just have a brief mention of her and an image. We don't know much more about how she did it, why she was called in to assist the white doctors, what methods she used. But we're finding people like this. And this is obviously before Mary Seacole. Yeah. And so I had to include her, even though we don't know a lot about her. Yeah. Well, let's talk about Mary Seacole, who you've mentioned there, one of the most famous black women throughout the British Empire, and she was a doctress.

What was the significance of that role? So doctress is similar to what nurse Flora would have been. These are women. Now, remember at this time, women are not allowed to do medicine. Even here in the UK, you know, you can't become a doctor. Doctors are for men. So, these are women who are usually free, but sometimes they're not, but they have skills. And some of those skills are coming from Africa, they've will have travelled over with enslaved people. And they're using those skills, combined with what they see the white doctors doing, and bringing those skills together. So they're doing nursing, but they can also do basic surgery as well. They know about herbal remedies,

they know how to mix medicines. And these doctresses actually have, in many cases, better skills than the doctors, which is why people are turning to them. So Mary Seacole actually comes out of that tradition. Her mother was a doctress and is around the same time as people like Nurse Flora and also another doctorist called Cuba Conwallis, who was a doctorist stroke nurse as well. In many ways, it feels like your book isn't just about black history, but it's also about nursing history as well. And Florence Nightingale, for example, played a key part in that. Absolutely. It is about nursing history as well. And it's about the parts of nursing history that we've forgotten or that we ignore. And it was only when I started

researching this book that I actually realised that there hasn't been as much done about nursing history as there should have been. And it's something that we need to look a bit more into. I think other parts of medicine have perhaps received more attention than nursing history has. And that might be partly because nursing has been associated with women and it's just sort of been done most of the time, often for free, without payment and without recognition. I want to fast forward to the Windrush generation who I mentioned earlier, and just the crucial role that they played in Britain's medical system. Yes, very, very crucial. And this year, 2024, is the 75th anniversary

of the NHS going to recruit in the Caribbean. And we've not really said very much about it, but they did play a crucial role. And what should we know? Well, we should know that the NHS, when it was started in 1948, from the very beginning, there was a shortage. So they did have to look to other places and they recruited worldwide.

But there were some key places like Ireland and Malta and the Caribbean. And they actually went to the Caribbean in 1949 and asked people to come. It wasn't just nurses. It was other people as well, obviously. But nursing at the time was a role that women wanted to get into to help improve their lives, help look after their families. And many of them just wanted to serve the NHS as well. Yeah, and that comes through in your book, which is beautifully illustrated as well. You've written many books on the history of black people, including one on the Windrush and on Afro hair as well. I know this is a subject very close to your heart and it's Black History Month at the moment. books on the history of black people, including one on the Windrush and on Afro hair as well.

I know this is a subject very close to your heart. And it's Black History Month at the moment. Many schools around the world will be celebrating this in some way. But there's also that voice saying it's not just about a month, it's about marking it all year round. Absolutely. And what are your thoughts on that? I actually really enjoy Black History Month because it gives us a chance to focus. But as you said, black history is all year round. Thank you so much, Kandasi Chimbiri and her book, The Story of Britain's Black Nurses is out now. Thank you to all of you who have been in touch

on Weekend Woman's Hour tomorrow. We'll hear from a powerhouse duo, the playwright Tanika Gupta and the award winning actor Meera Sile on their new play, which explores the story of a woman experiencing early onset Alzheimer's. Thanks for your company. That's it for now, and there's plenty more on BBC Sounds. Thanks for listening. There's plenty more from Woman's Hour over at BBC Sounds. Cafe Hope on BBC Radio 4.

By the time I'd finished these 100 meetings, I'd raised £50,000. I'm Rachel Burden, welcoming you into a virtual coffee shop where I chat to people looking to improve the lives of those around them. It's about tackling isolation and loneliness. Engaging in conversation with people that, you know, can make a massive difference. Amazing individuals trying to make the world a better place. It's a real gift. Cafe Hope from BBC Radio 4. Listen now on BBC Sounds. I'm Sarah Treleaven, and for over a year,

I've been working on one of the most complex stories I've ever covered. There was somebody out there who was faking pregnancies. I started, like, warning everybody. Every doula that I know. It was fake. No pregnancy. And the deeper I dig, the more questions I unearth.

How long has she been doing this? What does she have to gain from this? From CBC and the BBC World Service, The Con, Caitlin's Baby. It's a long story, settle in. Available now.