So why isn't Gavin Williamson listening?
A new poll suggests the British public want kids to learn about black history, the slave trade and British empire rather than the Tudors and the Norman conquest.
Around 67% of the British public told YouGov that Black history should be part of the national curriculum against just 21% who say it shouldn’t be.
The polling also suggested the topics which the public want to see less of are those that happened longest ago, like the Norman Conquest and the Tudors.
The poll also showed that most British people, including BAME people, don’t feel they know about black British history.
Following the summer’s Black Lives Matter protests, petitions calling for black history to be taught in schools received 366,000 signatures.
As they got so many signatures, the government had to respond to them. But the government’s brief response was labelled “inadequate” by the cross-party Petitions Committee.
In June, activist Ife Thompson told Left Foot Forward that the public is not aware of the intersecting histories of the UK and people of African descent. “We are doing a disservice to British history if we do not include and embed the narratives of Black people within it,” she said.
Joe Lo is a co-editor of Left Foot Forward
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