BRADFORD, UK, July 21, 2001: Following criticism of Bradford’s “ethnically segregated” schools in the city’s race review, Rhodesway school in Bradford could be a prototype for the sort of multiculturally tolerant school Herman Ouseley wants to see more of in the city. Ouseley’s report said the fact that so many Bradford schools were overwhelming white or Asian was adding to racial tensions in the city. But Rhodesway School, in the Allerton district of west Bradford, draws its 1,900 pupils almost equally from the white and Asian communities, with some African Caribbean pupils too. Its head teacher, John Fowler, agreed with the race report’s finding that many schools were in effect segregated, but said that was often more to do with the fact that so many were neighbourhood schools. “What we’ve got to do is to make a much higher profile for understanding other cultures, and if that starts in the junior schools then we can build in the secondary schools and try to gradually change the perceptions that people have.”
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