[3] The practice was exposed by educationalist Bernard Coard in his 1971 pamphlet How the West Indian Child is Made Educationally Sub-normal in the British School System.

The website's critics consensus reads, "Education casts its hopeful gaze on the future, offering a simple and effective end to the Small Axe series that solidifies Steve McQueen['s] place as a master storyteller.

"[4] Metacritic assigned the film a weighted average score of 88 out of 100, based on 13 critics, indicating "universal acclaim".

[5] Peter Debruge of Variety praised Education for its "clever" approach to portraying the subtle ways in which segregation occurs in early education without "being reductive about the institution or its employees."

He compared the film's "grainy, naturalistic" style to the works of Alan Clarke and Play for Today.