Our Challenge: Too many of us live parallel lives divided by income, age and ethnicity. Without a change of direction, the UK is sleepwalking into a segregated society. This is damaging for well-being, our economy and our society.
Our Network: : We bring together thousands of local schools, community organisations, businesses and individuals. Together – through practical action - we are forming relationships that build a stronger and more cohesive society. If you would like to join our network, click here
We can see it in our schools, our communities and our friendships.
- Our schools: Our schools are among the most socially segregated in the rich world – dividing children according to their parents’ income and ethnicity1. For the last ten years, half of all our poorest children have been concentrated in just a fifth of all schools2.
- Our communities: We are losing trust in each other3 and we trust others even less if we feel they are different from us4.
- Our friendships: Many of us only have friends who are just like us – in age, income and background. This can stop us from building genuine friendships with people who are different.
1 OECD; ‘Education at a Glance’; September 2012 2 Department for Education, internal data; cf ‘The Poverty Site’: http://www.poverty.org.uk/19/index.shtml 3 New Economics Foundation; ‘National Accounts of Well-being: bringing real wealth onto the balance sheet’; January 2009 4 Ipsos-Mori; ‘Life Satisfaction and Trust Other People’; December 2004
