‘Creepy’ Scottish Wellbeing test — child protection or human rights violation?
A Scottish standardized test designed by the government to assess schoolchildren’s wellbeing has come to the attention of many UK newspapers and magazines, including the dailymail.co.uk, who published an article Februrary 28th entitled Fury over ‘Orwellian’ psychological tests for schoolchildren which sees them interrogated over whether their parents nurture them enough. For those who are not familiar with the term ‘Orwellian’, according to Wikipedia, it describes a “situation, idea, or societal condition that George Orwell identified as being destructive to the welfare of a free and open society”. From several people’s point of view, this new testing measure is exactly that, notably a violation of parents’ basic human rights and childrens’ rights to privacy.
The psychological test is designed to ‘subtly’ quiz every schoolchild in Scotland about their private lives. For older children, they will have to answer questionnaires dealing with issues ranging from their home life to sexual health. They will have to respond on scales from zero to ten to questions, for example, about whether or not they drink, smoke, and feel close to their parents. For younger children, they will be tested through means of prompt cards, games and songs, which are designed to encourage children to reveal information about their home lives. Examples of prompt card questions include: ‘Who cleans your house? Is it cosy?’. Answers to these types of questions will then be coded by teachers who will recieve coding training. Teachers will then enter this information into a giant government database network and answers will be further analyzed to pick up students “at risk”.
This so-called ‘covert’ test, is part of Scotland’s Scottish National Party’s (SNP) new state guardian scheme. The SNP is the social-democratic political party in Scotland currently in power. There is much controversy surrounding the seemingly-intrusive nature of the test. Questions like whether or not a child’s parents make them feel special or if their home is ‘cosy’, add to the questionable face validity of the test.
One of the scariest parts about this test is that the answers are going to be kept on a giant government database network, and will further be analyzed to pick out schoolchildren for further investigation by their assigned “named person”. Under the Children and Young People (Scotland) Act 2014, every child is appointed a “named person” at birth to monitor their wellbeing up until the age of 18, and all families will receive 11 required visits to inspect their parenting skills. Whatsmore, “named persons” are entitled to demand information and share it with police and social workers without parents’ consent.
Ministers argue that the measure is necessary so that potential cases of abuse are spotted early, but it is being challenged by those who argue it breaches parents’ human rights.
The fact that this information is online and being talked about in news articles around the world makes me question how ‘covert’ this testing really is. How reliable will this test really be if parents are aware of its existence? But, according to the dailymail.co.uk, teachers are being instructed to “keep parents in the dark” about the true nature of the test.
According to social work expert Maggie Mellon, the scheme used to interpret the answers to pick out children for further investigation, has “no validity”. According to Mellon, some of the concerns the test is looking at are “subjective, potentially wrong or even based on prejudice.” Mellon goes on to say that “overall this is a crude tool with no validity — but it will be used and the information interpreted as evidence of child abuse or neglect.”
