Dr Alka Seghal Cuthbert talks about British School Education and the increasing influence of Critical Race Theory

Dr Alka Sehgal Cuthbert is an educator, academic, author and campaigner who believes passionately in the essential importance of impartiality both in education and as a prerequisite for the civilised conversations necessary for democracy to flourish. Alka became director of Don’t Divide Us following two years as its founder lead on education, a campaign which she felt impelled to join as a counter to the fractious and one-sided discussions about race relations in the UK which have dominated since 2020. Alka began her career teaching English Literature in inner-city London and went on to become a member of the Ofsted Advisory Panel on English. Until recently, she was still practising on the front line as an English teacher with the Civitas Education Charity supplementary schools project. She is a prolific author of specialist texts on education including the 2017 What Should Schools Teach? Disciplines, Subjects and the Pursuit of Truth (IoE UCL Press). She has spoken at numerous prestigious conferences and gave evidence to the 2016 All-Party Parliamentary Group Inquiry (APPGI) on Knowledge and Skills in Education. Alka made a characteristically bold entrance into politics in 2017, standing for the Brexit Party as a protest against the potential democratic deficit that would have followed had the popular vote not been enacted. Alka is a wife and mother of two adult children. She enjoys cooking, opera and travelling to visit family in India, when time allows. Follow Alka on Twitter: @ASCphiled