Flags, Identity, and the Questions We Ask

When I arrived back into my home town of York (UK) last week, the first thing that jumped out at me were the flags. Everywhere! Driving into the city, I couldn’t miss the rows of St. George’s Crosses flying from the lampposts. At first, I just assumed it was about the women’s football team or maybe the Rugby World Cup. I didn’t give it much thought until later, when my brother told me it’s actually part of a bigger thing happening here; people climbing lampposts to fly the British flag?

Now, depending on who you ask, this is either about community pride, keeping the streets clean, or something closer to anti-immigration and nationalism. And honestly, when I first saw them, I turned to Natalie and said, “This feels a bit uncomfortable". That sea of symbols gave me an uneasy feeling. But here’s the thing; it’s complicated. People should be free to fly their flag if they want to. In the UK, though, it often carries a different weight. If you’ve got a flag outside your house, people tend to assume you’re racist or anti-immigration. That’s not always fair. National pride doesn’t have to be negative. It can build a sense of belonging, responsibility, and care. At the same time, nationalism can be double-edged. It can bring people together, but it can also divide. It can inspire pride, but it can just as easily be used to exclude. And that’s the part I think is worth talking about; why people are flying the flag, what it represents, and who it includes or leaves out?

And this is where the Global Classroom comes in. Because let’s be honest, conversations like this rarely happen in schools. They’re too messy, too political, too sensitive. And online it's imply devisive. But our learners can have these discussions. They can debate nationalism, identity, racism, immigration, the real stuff that shapes our world. Not because we’re telling them what to think, but because we give them the space to explore these things for themselves.

This also ties into a comment I saw online recently about this project being "privileged tourism". But, if you zoom out, being educated in other countries isn’t unusual at all. There are nearly 15,000 international schools worldwide, serving millions of kids. The difference, though, is that what we offer is lived experience. Not a documentary, not a textbook. Our learners won’t just learn about culture, they live it. And at a time when nationalism is on the rise, I can’t think of anything more important than young people being able to step outside their own borders and see the world from different perspectives.

They also commented that tourism is destroying the planet. And I agree, it often does. Which is why we’ve been very intentional about how we do this. We are working with local partners. We are choosing experiences that respect communities and the environment. And we want our learners to learn how to travel and live in ways that are thoughtful, sustainable, and kind.

Because in the end, it’s not just about flying a flag. It’s about what that flag means, and how we prepare the next generation to engage with a world that’s bigger, more complex, and more connected than ever.