Aspirations
One of the major policy goals for government is to improve the aspirations of young Muslims in the UK. Low aspirations are related to a range of poor academic attainment and professional achievement – regardless of the social or ethnic group. They can also feed into a general sense of isolation and exclusion from mainstream British life. In some cases, this sense of exclusion is considered to be a major causal factor for people who become involved in extremist movements.
Despite a strong policy commitment to improving aspirations, what actually works and how remains little understood. Demos proposes to undertake a major quantitative evaluation of the UK’s leading organisation working with young Muslims – Mosiac. This will allow us to produce a firm evidence base about what works, and set out a practical new direction for policy making and project delivery.