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Identity building as a pathway to children and young people’s wellbeing in schools

For decades now, there has been a looming child and youth mental health crisis in many developed nations globally (WHO, 2020). Nations have varied in policy responses to the issue, but what many...

The corridors of silence

Our vernacular is somewhat noisy with idioms of silence: deafening silences; as silent as the grave; a wall of silence; suffering in silence. Other idioms offer implicit references to silence,...

The free school meal voucher scheme & children’s access to food during the Covid-19 crisis

Education & Covid-19: BERA Small Grants Fund research reports

With schools closed in the UK in response to the Covid-19 crisis, children who would normally receive free school meals were at an elevated risk of food insecurity. However, the voucher scheme...

We need an evidence-based expert approach to the post-pandemic recovery of young people

In December 2020, the Westminster government promised to set up an expert group to consider solutions to the huge variability of the impact of the coronavirus pandemic on pupils’ educational...

Children have a right to be involved in decisions about their future education, health and wellbeing

Since the start of the Covid-19 pandemic, children across the world have experienced significant changes to their lives. Save the Children (2020, p. 4) report that an estimated 99 per cent of...

Spring 2021

Research Intelligence issue 146: Contemporary issues in mental health and wellbeing in education

‘The significant return to normality’: Back to school in England, but who is missing?

As part of the gradual lifting of lockdown measures in England, following the ‘second wave’ of the Covid-19 pandemic here, schools reopen wholesale today, 8 March 2021. For many parents and...

What ‘building back better’ really means for our children: Anne Longfield’s final speech as the children’s commissioner for England

On February 17 2021, Anne Longfield OBE gave her final speech as the children’s commissioner for England. Her words were a clarion cry for the UK’s children, who for the past 12 months have...

BERA Bites, issue 7: Exploring the impact of Covid-19: Pedagogy, curriculum & assessment

BERA Bites

The coronavirus pandemic and its associated lockdowns upended our lives and presented challenges and consequences that were previously unimaginable. Teachers were flung in at the deep end with...

Learning loss or learning disruption?

Alarm has been expressed about the likely impact of Covid-19 on children’s academic achievement with terms such as ‘closing the gap’, ‘learning loss’ and ‘catch up’ permeating...

Has there really been a decline in happiness among young people in the UK?

The Children’s Society published its most recent edition of The Good Childhood Report in August (Children’s Society, 2020). Concerningly, it reported that even before Covid-19 there had been a...

Supporting quiet, shy or anxious Black, Asian and minority ethnic children with English as an additional language in the early years

Many articles that have been written in relation to the Black Lives Matter agenda, state that education is key to improving Black, Asian and minority ethnic (BAME) children’s life chances...