Lit in Colour Five-Year Report: Progress Made, but Urgent Change Still Needed

Lit in Colour, the Penguin Books–led campaign to make the English Literature curriculum more inclusive of authors of colour, has published its five-year progress report. While the findings show signs of improvement, the report makes clear that change is happening far too slowly. And that, more importantly, without decisive intervention, generations of students will continue to miss out.

Since the campaign launched in 2020, the percentage of students in England studying an author of colour at GCSE has risen from 0.76% to 1.9%. However, the report warns that at the current rate, it will be 2046 before just 10% of GCSE students answer a single English Literature exam question on a text by an author of colour.

More starkly, despite 38% of pupils in England being from Black, Asian and ethnic-minority backgrounds, students will not be universally offered the opportunity to study an author of colour at GCSE until 2115.

A call for government action and teacher support

The campaign is calling on government to ensure all GCSE students have the opportunity to study a full-length text by an author of colour, alongside providing teachers with the resources, training and confidence to teach these texts well.

Tom Weldon, CEO of Penguin Books, said the campaign has always been rooted in the belief that “every young person deserves to see themselves in the books they read and study.” While progress has been made through partnerships with schools and exam boards, he stressed that “now is not the time for complacency, but urgency.”

With the National Year of Reading underway, Weldon argues there is a real opportunity to reform GCSE English Literature so that reading becomes a source of joy, empathy and belonging - not just assessment.

Why diverse texts matter

Author Bernardine Evaristo emphasised that the case for a more inclusive curriculum is not about rejecting literary tradition, but expanding it. When students see writers of colour reflected in the texts they study, it broadens their understanding of literature and the world, fostering empathy and deeper engagement.

“The argument for a more diverse reading list is not an argument against the tradition, a common assumption and criticism from naysayers, but rather, it is an argument for both: books that reflect our multi-racial society as well as those that are rooted in its literary history.”

What Lit in Colour has achieved

Despite the challenges, the report highlights significant successes. Through the Lit in Colour Pioneers programme, developed with Pearson Edexcel, the number of students answering on a text by an author of colour at GCSE has more than doubled since 2019.

The campaign has supported 300 schools and over 32,000 students to study GCSE or A-level texts by writers of colour, increased the proportion of GCSE set texts by authors of colour from 12% to 36%, and donated 280,000 books to more than 1,300 schools, reaching over 750,000 pupils.

Dr Runnymede Trust CEO Shabna Begum described this as meaningful progress - but urged government and the wider education sector to commit to accelerating change so that the curriculum truly reflects the students it serves.

The Recommendations

We make three key recommendations which will help achieve this goal, which we address to government, exam boards, publishers, schools, teachers, parents and other interested organisations.

Together these recommendations will help achieve our goal: that every GCSE student in England should have the opportunity to study a book by an author of colour.

1. We should introduce all young people to books by authors of colour and featuring protagonists of colour in classrooms, libraries and homes. This should become a core element of efforts to promote reading for pleasure.

2. The curriculum should give every student the opportunity to study full-length texts by authors of colour at GCSE and A level. They should be embedded in the curriculum at earlier Key Stages.

3. Significant, sustained investment is required to develop equitable resources for teaching books by authors of colour and to support schools to teach new texts. Teachers also require support to engage with themes of race, racism and empire where they appear in 19th century novels.

Supporting schools to make the teaching of English Literature more inclusive matters, as curriculum content plays a crucial role in young people’s reading enjoyment, and reading for pleasure has a demonstrably positive effect on educational outcomes, social development and wellbeing.

In polling by Public First for Lit in Colour, 33% of young people say the books they study in school put them off reading and 68% of parents and young people say they want an English Literature curriculum that reflects the diversity of modern-day Britain.

Case Study: The Swan School

In 2023 The Swan School in Oxford were one of the first in the country to start teaching My Name is Leon by Kit de Waal at GCSE. Its status as a coming-of-age novel, where the protagonist moves from a lack of autonomy to gaining power, resonates strongly with students.

“There was a real sense of positivity this year when students went into the exam; they genuinely enjoyed it... There was real enthusiasm and buy-in for the text and the students were excited to write about it.” - Head of English, Harriet Hinze