'Multicultural' curriculum the reason for poor white kids failing?

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/education/educationnews/10930854/Poor-white-pupils-put-off-school-by-multicultural-timetable.html

This piece from the telegraph features a report that claims white British working class students are being turned off school because the curriculum shuns British traditions.

"Researchers called on the Department for Education to develop a 'curriculum that treats white British identity in the same way as ethnic minorities'."

What are your thoughts on this?

Historically though they never achieved any more when the syllabus was still full of The Battle of Trafalgar, and epic tales of Scott going to the South pole.

OK cool down there mate.
"Shakespeare and Dickens are appalling writers..."
That quite literally renders all arguments you make from that sentence onwards invalid.
Your participation in this debate has been noted. Goodbye.

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I think this is the real problem.

A lot of kids just don't care about history, it's not about lacking in national pride.

I went to school on an estate in Manchester that was largely 'poor white' kids and I can tell you for a fact those kids did not give two ****s about Henry VIII, the Reformation and the formation of the Church of England which is one of the main moments of our statehood and getting our identity away from overseas power, Charles I and the English Civil War. We did all this at my school and most of the kids just switched off. There was no feeling of "English pride" that made them want to study this, most of the time when the history classes were going on, they were out drinking cider outside the local Spar.

Also this was during a 17 year long Tory government as well....

Of course in the convenient story that you will hear from some on the right, back in those glory days all children turned up to school in impeccable discipline to learn about the history of their English forefathers, and it was all ruined by a Labour government and a load of non whites coming over to our schools.....sadly that story does not wash.

Yeah, how can you have multicultural Maths?

It's nothing to do with multiculturalism, it's parenting. Poor white kids are more likely to have parents who don't give a **** about education than poor kids from other ethnic groups. It's as simple as that. Poor white people are in general the lowest of the low in society for some reason. For example, a poor white woman is much more likely to be a smoking alcoholic single mother than a poor asian woman. This is just fact. I say this as a white person.

Pretty much the end of the road: Britain stops being about universal values and becomes a set of officially-recognised ethnonationalist tribes. It's a natural conclusion of treating any ethnic group separately, but indicates the problem was with that whole policy.

That said, it's a social problem rather than an educational one. I suspect the real reason that white working class children do worse than ethnic minorities taken as a whole is that this is a pre-selected group of people who already had low aptitudes before they even entered school. In 30 years the high aptitude recent immigrant working class children with whom they are being compared will be middle class and so in turn will their children; for natives this sorting process happened 100 or more years ago.

Shakespeare's importance to the curriculum is debatable because of his influence in the English language. Dickens really is total crap; all his characters are totally one dimensional and his use of language is clunky. The best writers in the English language are without doubt, either Irish or American (and I am neither Irish nor American in case you are wondering)

Deal with it

But when the rest of the year had tedious "celebrations" of other "cultures" all the time, this can interrupt proper education.

To be honest, I would much prefer to learn about India than I would learn about Henry VIII making up a religion because he wanted a new wife. British history aside from the Imperial period, is so pointlessly dull. I also think that Shakespeare and Dickens are appalling writers who would never be studied on their own merit. At the same time, I question how this makes much differences anyway, mathematics and science has no cultural slant and English classes were mostly about studying writing techniques, so this seems like people complaining about nothing in my mind.

Totes legit .There's "dull" British history summed up in one sentence...
And that literary commentary.
Fair opinion and all I suppose-how about you move to India or whatever third world country you want to learn about so badly?If India's aloud preservation of its heritage than so is Britain.Don't like it?Leave because you don't belong.

It's nothing to do with multiculturalism, it's parenting. Poor white kids are more likely to have parents who don't give a **** about education than poor kids from other ethnic groups. It's as simple as that. Poor white people are in general the lowest of the low in society for some reason. For example, a poor white woman is much more likely to be a smoking alcoholic single mother than a poor asian woman. This is just fact. I say this as a white person.

There is only thing that is required of me living in this country and that is to obey the law.

If you don't like this, then maybe you should move to Iran, North Korea or some other totalitarian state, because clearly your opinions of how society should be run, are more in line with theirs than they are ours.