Disrupting unlawful exclusion from school of minoritised children and young people racialized as Black: using Critical Race Theory composite counter-storytelling

ABSTRACT Utilising Critical Race Theory (CRT) as the analytical lens and CRT composite counter-storytelling as the method, this paper seeks to illuminate the experiences of minoritised children and young people racialised as Black in relation to encounters with the exclusionary practice called ‘off-rolling’. We conceptualise off-rolling as a hidden process of exclusion in education, and the stories shared in this paper bring into sharp focus the educational, relational and emotional impacts of camouflaged exclusionary practices. We offer four composite stories of exclusion to demonstrate how some of the most vulnerable, excluded, and marginalised young Black people from English urban cities experience further marginalisation because off-rolling, we argue, places learners in a space (both physically and educationally) located beyond care and inclusion. Storytelling is mobilised as a central method in CRT for challenging and exposing exclusionary practices, as it foregrounds the knowledge and lived experience of people of colour and we explore the processes of constructing such counter-stories. As an encouragement to reflection and critical conversation about unlawful exclusion and racial disparities, this paper was written with three goals in mind. The first is that it may inspire educators of colour to tell counter-stories that name their own reality and experiences of exclusion. Second, that in reading and responding to counter-stories, white educators will be encouraged to develop their own racial literacy. Finally, the third goal is that the call to action is answered from within and beyond the confines of academia, where inclusion and racial justice in education can no longer be left to wait.