First of all a little history of the project !

The Schools Linking Project started in late 2001, after the disturbances in Bradford during the previous summer and the events of 9/11. It began with a meeting between the Year 6 classes from two primary schools; schools that had populations with different ethnic backgrounds, one Pakistani Muslim and the other mainly white British. Both of these schools were doing excellent work in different ways and one of the aims of the meeting was to bring the good work from both schools together. We quickly discovered that teachers combining their different skills and perspectives could be a powerful catalyst for new learning and raising achievement. The children quickly discovered that they could make friends with children with whom they would never normally have contact. We all realised that linking schools could have a powerful impact on young people in Bradford. As one boy said; “If all schools in Bradford did this we wouldn’t have riots.”

This website has two parts - firstly the public domain where you are now, where anyone can find out what the SLP is and does. There is also a protected part of the site, which only teachers involved in the project can access to work with children to record the journeys of their learning through their linking year. Schools can look at each other's work and share ideas and resources. We do however aim to have a sample of this work available on the public part of the site, in the snap shot gallery, in the near future. we are also in the process of developing new materials, which we will have more news about soon.

The project has developed organically over the past six years into a model, which supports schools across the district to develop working partnerships, so that children from different ethnic and cultural backgrounds, who would not normally meet, because they live and attend schools in different parts of the district, have the opportunities to meet, work and play together. The schools work on planned themes throughout the year and work in partnership with creative practitioners to provide exciting and inclusive activities. Detailed aims and objectives of the project can be found on the Aims and Objectives page of the site.

A recent external evaluation shows that this work clearly has a significant impact on cross-cultural relationships and attitudes. You can find the headlines and the full report on the report sections of this site, where it can be downloaded as a PDF.