Rise in racist incidents in schools, figures show
GettyRacist incidents in a county's secondary schools appear to be rising.
The BBC asked all 36 secondary schools in Cumbria for information about recorded incidents of racism over the past five years, with 25 responding.
Of those, 14 gave their data by calendar year, with recorded racist incidents rising from at least eight in 2019 to at least 57 in 2023.
Cumberland Council said it was reviewing the services it provided to schools so issues such as race were "effectively addressed". Westmorland and Furness Council said it was working on a "package of support" to help schools tackle the issue.
The other nine schools provided their data by academic year.
In those schools, reported incidents rose from 36 in the 2019-2020 academic year to 91 in the 2022-2023 academic year.
'Collective responsibility'
The charity Anti Racist Cumbria said it received at least one report of racism in a school each week.
It said about 66% of those reports came from primary schools.
Janett Walker at the charity said schools would take racism more seriously if they viewed it as a "safeguarding issue".
"It does result in trauma in much the same way as any other safeguarding issue," she said.
If schools understood that better, she said "there would be more reporting and there would be more action".
'Racism is insidious'
One Cumbrian parent of a four-year-old girl of mixed heritage, who the BBC is not naming, said she was not sure if her daughter's school took racism seriously.
"I don't think she quite knew how to articulate it because, bear in mind, she's four... it was 'I feel like people treat me differently because I look different'," said the parent.
"For me, personally, because I see that happen so early on, that's where my concerns are."
She said she had to approach the school twice with her concerns, including worries teachers did not know the racist origins of some nursery rhymes, before a meeting was set up.
"We had a meeting with the head and had a very clear conversation of what the issues were and I was presented with – 'the school's very diverse'," she said.
"That was a concern in itself because racism is insidious and it is entirely separate to diversity."