The linguistic and ethnic diversity of the school population in Northumberland based on school census data, January 2012

School census information is analysed in January of each academic year to identify those pupils whose heritage is Black and Minority ethnic (BME) and who are learning English as an additional language (EAL)

Black and minority ethnic pupils comprise 4.5% of Northumberland’s total school population with Polish, Panjabi and Chinese speaking children as the largest groups.

In January 2012 a cohort of 1 851 pupils from a total of 41 351 have been identified as BME

The breakdown by BME group across the county is White British 95.3%, Asian 1.5%, Black 0.1%, Chinese 0.2%, Mixed 1.1%, Other Ethnic Group 0.1%, Other White 1.2% with 0.4% information not obtained/refused

83.4% of our schools have pupils whose ethnicities are

other than white British

16.5 % (46) of our schools have an entirely white

British pupil population

Black and minority ethnic

children constitute 4.5% of

the pupil population of

Northumberland in 2012

This is a significant

increase of 22% compared with

3.7% in January 2011

The School census data does

not include the ethnicity and first

language information for

pupils attending the Academies in Blyth, Hirst and Berwick, where BME pupils are

known to attend.

2,302 fewer pupils have been included in this analysis than in 2011, however

the data demonstrates an increase of 240

BME pupils (0.5% of the entire pupil population, 13%

of the BME population)

The location of black and minority communities across the County is changing and the data suggests that there has been a substantial increase of 22% in the overall percentage of BME pupils in our schools from 2011 to 2012

The educational achievement of the black and minority ethnic groups in Northumberland in 2011 was at least in line with the national average for all pupils, and is therefore not consistent with the national trend of under-achievement for certain ethnic groups

Ethnicity % of BME population

Any other white background 22.5%

Any other Asian background 17.4%

Any other mixed background 10%

White and Asian 8%

Indian 8%

Pakistani 6%

Chinese 5%

White and Black Caribbean 4.5%

Bangladeshi 4%

White and Black African 3.8%

Any other ethnic group 3%

Gypsy/Roma 2.6%

Irish 2%

Any other Black background 0.9%

African 0.8%

Traveller of Irish heritage 0.3%

Caribbean 0.1%

Partnership BME pupils as a % of the LA’s BME population

No. of BME pupils in partnership

BME pupils as % of all pupils in partnership

Alnwick 8.7% 161 5%

Ashington Trust 5.4% 100 3%

Astley 2% 40 2%

Bedlington 5.7% 106 3%

Berwick 3.5% 64 3.6%

Blyth 5% 94 2.7%

Coquet 1.5% 29 1.8%

Cramlington 6% 114 2.5%

Haydon Bridge 3% 55 2.7%

Hexham 7.5% 138 4%

Morpeth 11% 204 5.5%

Ponteland 18.5% 343 10.5%

Prudhoe 5.6% 104 4%

Roman Catholic 16% 299 9%

Type of school No. of BME pupils % of the population of that phase or type of school

% of Northumberland’s

BME pupil population

First 787 6% 42%

Primary 217 4% 8%

Middle 401 4.5% 22%

Secondary 62 2% 3%

High 369 3.5% 20%

Special 15 3% 0.8%

In the case of 103 pupils who attend schools in Northumberland, parents have refused to supply information about ethnicity for school census purposes

There are currently 61 heritage languages spoken by children in Northumberland schools. Children who speak English as an additional language comprise 1.5% of the pupil population

40% of our schools have no EAL pupils, and 60% have at least one pupil speaking English as an additional language

Partnership Number of EAL pupils

% of EAL pupil population

Ranked by % of EAL pupils

taught

Alnwick 36 5.6% 7

Astley 8 1.25% 13

Ashington 45 7% 5

Bedlington 19 3% 10

Berwick 66 10% 3

Blyth 38 6% 6

JC Spence/Coquet 11 1.7% 12

Cramlington 28 4.4% 9

Haydon Bridge 12 1.8% 11

Hexham 34 5% 8

Morpeth 59 9% 4

Ponteland 159 25% 1

Prudhoe 38 6% 6

Roman Catholic 76 12% 2

Special 6 1% 14

10 most spoken heritage languages in Northumberland

% of EAL pupil population who speak the language

Polish 14%

Chinese 11%

Panjabi 10%

Bengali 9%

Urdu 7%

Tagalog/Filipino 5%

Other than English 4%

Malayalam 3%

German 2.8%

Arabic 2.6%

The most significant numbers of BME pupils are taught in the schools in the Ponteland partnership

The smallest numbers of BME or EAL children are taught in the Coquet and Astley partnerships of schools, and special schools have fewest of all

First schools have the highest percentage of their pupil population from BME backgrounds (4%) and secondary schools the least (2%)

Schools in the Roman Catholic Partnership teach 16% of the county’s BME children