[4][5][6][7] The daughter of an Indo-Guyanese academic, Birbalsingh was born in New Zealand and raised in Canada until she was 15, when her father began lecturing at the University of Warwick.

She cultivated an interest in education when reading French and philosophy at New College, Oxford and, after graduating, went into teaching at state schools in south London.

She writes that the book "opened [her] eyes" to what was wrong in schools, and argues that education should be about teaching children knowledge, not learning skills.

She maintains that misguided progressive politics in schools have held ethnic minority and working-class children back from academic success and that the political left seek to address problems within education by pouring more money into schools rather than fixing deeper issues, stating "there is a lot of power in ideas, and if the ideas are wrong, then the education system will not deliver.

She argued that her experiences working as a teacher in deprived areas led her to believe that the state education sector encouraged a "culture of excuses and low standards" with regard to discipline and quality.

[41] She has likewise advocated "digital drop-off" schemes, where children and parents were encouraged to bring in electronic devices to be locked in a school safe for the holidays.

[43][44] She also claimed that young black students were being held back from success in school by teachers who "are scared of being called racist" if they discipline them.

[45] Birbalsingh has advocated the singing of patriotic songs such as "I Vow To Thee My Country" or "Jerusalem" in school assemblies, saying that they make teenagers feel proud to be British.

[40] She has argued that the killing of Floyd was unjustified, and that white Britons have avoided serious conversations about racism, and that this in turn has drawn people to BLM.

[47] Birbalsingh is opposed to teaching children about white privilege in schools and to unconscious bias training for staff or pupils, arguing that such measures encourage racial segregation over constructively solving racism, and distract from the true meaning of education.

[48][49] She has also maintained that using the term "white privilege" is unhelpful to ethnic minority students, as it creates an exaggerated perception that they are perpetually oppressed by the political establishment, and diminishes incentives to work hard.

[50] In a 2021 debate hosted by the Henry Jackson Society, Birbalsingh also asserted her opposition to what she described as the growth of "woke culture" in education, arguing that it is more concerned with "making children into revolutionaries" and inserting political bias into classes over instilling values such as kindness, tolerance and hard work.

[52] In 2017, Birbalsingh was included by Anthony Seldon in his list of the 20 most influential figures in British education,[53] and in 2019 she was awarded the Contrarian Prize.