Every Child Can: Challenging the soft Bigotry of Low expectations

Teachers make daily decisions about what students can handle: what texts to read, what tasks to attempt, what behaviours are acceptable. But sometimes, these decisions aren’t maximising a child’s full potential. They’re based on assumptions about a child’s background, perceived ability, or past performance.
This is what the speechwriter Michael Gerson coined as “the soft bigotry of low expectations.” And it remains one of the most damaging and insidious forms of inequity in education.

What It Looks Like in Practice
The “soft bigotry” isn’t overt prejudice. It’s subtle. It sounds like:

• “He’s doing well… for him.”
• “It’s too hard for them; they won’t get it.”
• “These kids can’t sit and listen for more than a few minutes.”

These low expectations don’t protect students: they limit them. When we water down the curriculum, avoid challenging tasks, or excuse underperformance, we rob students of the very experiences that help them grow. We send a damaging message: You’re not expected to succeed.
As Noel Pearson, Indigenous leader and education advocate, has warned:
“Low expectations are the scourge of disadvantaged schools. They are the disease that infects schools with endemic failure.”
But when we raise the bar and teach with belief, incredible things happen

Every Child, Every Chance: Changing the Narrative
Take the quiet child whose previous teacher rarely heard her speak. She seemed content to fade into the background; until warm calling invited her into the conversation with kindness and consistency. In the beginning, her answers seemed to surprise her as much as anyone. Soon, she was one of the first to put her hand up, keen to share her thinking. Her confidence hadn’t appeared overnight. It had been built, brick by brick, because someone believed her voice mattered. And so she started to believe that it mattered too.

Or the Prep student who couldn’t count to three when she arrived. Rather than hold her back or simplify the content, we gave her full access to the same high-quality maths instruction as her peers; with scaffolding and support where needed. Slowly, she caught up. By year’s end, she was one of our strongest mathematical thinkers. She didn’t need a watered-down curriculum; she needed a chance.
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And then there was the class who couldn’t sit on the mat for more than a few minutes: restless, distracted, and disconnected. It would’ve been easy to lower expectations, to teach in five-minute bursts or avoid whole-class instruction altogether. But we didn’t. We built their stamina. We made the lessons engaging, checked for understanding constantly, and taught behaviour as intentionally as we taught reading. Within weeks, they were locked in. By mid-year, they could sit together for 30 minutes of rich, focused instruction: fully present and thriving.

What High Expectations Really Mean
Having high expectations isn’t about demanding perfection or pushing kids too hard. It’s about:

• Believing every student is capable of growth
• Teaching rigorous and rich content with appropriate scaffolds
• Providing daily opportunities to think and respond
• Teaching routines and behaviours explicitly; not assuming students “just know”
• Celebrating effort and progress, not just polish and perfection

Zig Engelmann, creator of Direct Instruction, said it well:
“If the student hasn't learned, the teacher hasn't taught. And if the student can't learn, the teacher hasn't found the way to teach.”

Breaking the Cycle
To fight the soft bigotry of low expectations, we must first look inward. We must ask:

• What assumptions am I making about this student’s capacity?
• Am I giving them the same opportunities I’d expect for my own child?
• Have I taught this explicitly, or am I expecting them to infer it?
• Do I truly believe they can meet the standard with the right support?

Every child, regardless of postcode, language background, or prior achievement, deserves a teacher who believes in them. They deserve a rigorous curriculum, meaningful feedback, and a classroom culture that says:
You belong here. We believe in you. Let’s get to work.

No child should be held back by our assumptions.
Let’s be bold and ensure every child can thrive.