Has anyone had a meeting with their child's school following non-acknowledgement of reciept of Transgender Trend Schools guide?

[Jog22]

I emailed it twice last year to head teacher - the second following an enquiry and being told they couldn't find it. I then handed in a printed copy with a covering letter. Again no acknowledgement. I'm told this is probably normal considering work load etc so am thinking the only way is to ask for a meeting. However I'm not sure how to go about it. I want to stay calm and articulate obviously but it's a subject that makes me irate and incoherent.

I imagine I would start from a safeguarding angle and asking for assurance that their material re PSHE and any special assemblies are not 'promoting' trans however how do I clearly delineate that I have no problem with the teaching of gay/lesbian awareness at the same time?

Any tips re meeting etiquette and content gratefully received.

I would focus on the outcomes you want to ensure (eg single sex provision, normal safeguarding practice, no lobby groups teaching contested ideology), and ask how the school will ensure this.

I would try to engage with school governors and get them involved. Find out who they are and if you feel you would get a positive response approach one of the parent governors perhaps?

Also worth highlighting some of the coverage around pressure to transition and the dangers/costs of the medical side of thusvto explain why you are concerned with some of the lobby group messaging. The stories around Tavistock etc.

Have you contacted your local authority and asked them to prove that they have done an impact study on the trans materials that they will use in schools? This I think is quite important as it’s a top down approach from what the LA distribute?

I would do that first.

I’ve sent a few out to local schools, as well as DD’s. I always present it as an alternative to other information sent out by other groups.

The Transgender Trend pack is fantastic as it points out the safeguarding issues that the school’s pastoral staff are probably struggling with. I ask the school to just read it and contrast it with Stonewall’s advice, and decide for themselves.

Ask for a meeting with the head or head of pastoral. They are not going to put anything in writing that agrees one way or the other. Bare in mind, that even with a face to face meeting, they are not going to openly agree with you. Read Stonewall’s, GIRES’ and Metmaids policies and show them where the conflicts of safeguarding arise.

I expect the teachers are struggling already with the huge funding shortfall and the fact that there aren't enough teachers to go around. They don't have time to police kids' gender preferences on top of everything else.

OP what exactly do you want a meeting for? what is your issue? has the school done something wrong?

BTW what is 'metmaid' ?

Pepperpot Mermaids are a controversial lobby group

www.transgendertrend.com/mermaids-ceo-reveals-her-views/

Metmaid is Mermaid spelt incorrectly!

Teachers are struggling with no funding, but they’re also struggling with the increased demand to deal with things they’re not qualified in.

With acadamisation, came the dismantling of the Local Authority, and their packages and collective safeguarding information. Schools have to buy in packages from outside services, packages that have been shown to have no impact assessments done on them before being rolled out to schools.

The teachers I have spoken to have been grateful for another perspective as they felt unable to speak out at their discomfort it’s the guidance from Stonewall, etc, as it’d make them a bigot.

So now teachers have to deal with all of this as well? no wonder they are leaving the profession in droves.

Thanks for all the responses so far. Useful in helping me formulate why I'm wanting a meeting and what outcome I want from it. (It's a primary school btw)

Lumene - Thanks, I will gather info on Tavistock and the recent news of their lack of follow-up studies

NonHypotheticalLurkingParent - Useful to compare and contrast with Mermaids et al and have that with me (as well as the Allsorts section about the removal of the objecting child.) I shall have to get down to some serious reading. Also the school is moving towards academisation so the buying in of un-assessed packages would be focal.

They currently use Jigsaw scheme of work which looks fairly innocuous.... however I'm concerned that their Equalities and Inclusion Policy refers to 'gender' not 'sex'. and has 'gender identity' instead of 'gender reassignment' as a protected characteristic so they may have been got at somewhere along the line.

I expect the teachers are struggling already with the huge funding shortfall and the fact that there aren't enough teachers to go around.

Someone's paying for trans lobby organisations to go into schools to teach children that they all have a gender identity. Where's that money coming from and shouldn't it be spent on education instead?

I have found the relevant Allsorts bit.

www.mermaidsuk.org.uk/assets/media/East%20Sussex%20schools%20transgender%20toolkit.pdf
(Page 30 if link doesn't go there)
Has an example of a transgirl wanting to be in the changing room of the girls and if a girl objects then it is SHE who is required to be removed and accommodated elsewhere.
In Scenario 2 a girl objects to a transgirl competing with her in a sport and she is encouraged to ‘do another activity’. The cognitive dissonance surrounding this issue is immense. The onus is all on the girl moving aside to make way for the transgirl even in her own spaces which under EQ210 are under the protected characteristic of sex. How is this not seen as discriminatory against her?

And how is this not a safeguarding issue as further back in the document they state;
"4.2 SafeguardingThere are no issues under child protection or safeguarding law, or practice specific to trans* children and young people, aside from what is in place to keep all children and young people safe.” I'd like to explore this too (without sounding like a bigot obvs)

Jog22
Safeguarding issues re trans lobby groups getting into in schools:

They tell teachers they can keep a child's secrets if they disclose worries about being the opposite sex
They insist teachers immediately affirm a child's words and don't refer or question.
They tell schools that they can keep a child's transition secret from their parents (and this has already happened to a number of families).

Schools are not meant to allow 'political' organisations access to children other than as part of a balanced discussion. All the trans groups include lobbying as part of their aims yet for some reason the groups use the trans teflon to magically identify as 'experts' in child development, child and teenage psychology and having children's interests at heart - when actually, nothing could be further from the truth.

Transitioning may not be a safeguarding issue but it may well be. A child in the grip of this needs careful support from people with qualifications and experience. Telling individual teachers to keep this confidential is outrageously dangerous. Adults in schools must share the information and then there can be thoughtful discussions about how to proceed, confidentiality, talking to parents etc. Schools do this all the time with safeguarding. It is only since the trans pressure groups have been allowed to access schools, that there is now a suggestion that some children (gender non conforming) should be set apart from safeguarding.

The last group to do this in my professional lifetime was the Paedophile Information Exchange who argued that children below the age of consent had the right to be seen as sexual beings and it was oppressive to deny them this right. They had quite a lot of traction on the left for some time..........

truthisarevolutionaryact
"...there is now a suggestion that some children (gender non conforming) should be set apart from safeguarding." Oh my. I don't know much about safeguarding but I'm assuming the onus is on protecting the child - this would be casting them out into the wilderness. Shocking.

OP
Trans groups use an adult interpretation of confidentiality. If you look at all their demands about the evils of dead naming, records being changed to remove original names, their trans identity always being positively affirmed, they have just applied these beliefs about secrecy to schools and children.
They are far too arrogant / ignorant to appreciate that we safeguard children through openness, a level of scepticism (every adult being DBS checked etc) and not allowing adults to keep confidences, making them report all concerns. I can think of countless children who were abused - even when they told teachers back in the 70s and early 80s - because the adult failed to share the information appropriately. That's why we have the safeguarding legislation that we do.

These groups are dismantling this legislation bit by bit for their own purposes.

truthisarevolutionaryact
Thanks for this insight. I need to find egs of the not telling parents however the affirmation is all over allsorts. I'm focusing on the 'adult interpretation of confidentiality'. The schools safeguarding policy on website is very vague. There's not an actual policy there....

I agree with you about the dismantling of legislation. I take it you've seen this thread?
www.mumsnet.com/Talk/womens_rights/3318615-Pedophile-Manifesto

The thing is I can't bring this into a meeting. I will look like a raving conspiracy nut. Anybody who's done the research and has the quotes. This might be a really useful thing to put together for other parents with concerns who haven't the time or confidence to address directly with the schools.

I think the reason teachers are not supposed to share information shared in confidence about a child’s gender identity is in case it might put them at risk by telling the parents? Not all parents are as understanding as you or I, and I can imagine that there are some parents that might react really badly?

I think the reason teachers are not supposed to share information shared in confidence about a child’s gender identity is in case it might put them at risk by telling the parents? Not all parents are as understanding as you or I, and I can imagine that there are some parents that might react really badly?

I've c&ped one of LangCleg's many posts explaining these are fundamental principles when working with children:

confidential disclosures safeguarding 101. A child with a secret you are keeping for it, is a child easiest to control for grooming and abuse purposes.

parental alienation/not keeping parents informed - parents cannot parent successfully if they are not informed of things going on their children's lives, nor can they be alerted to or protect their children from the possibility of abuse. Best practice is to inform parents (unless they are abusive themselves)

no involvement of other agencies - multi agency working provides a check and balance against abuser infiltration and is helpful working with children who may need different expertise to resolve issues. This is statutory practice.

These are just three points of many. And it should be noted that with regard to SEND children, some of this advice is almost certainly unlawful.

Good Twitter thread with other detail here: twitter.com/mrkhtake2/status/1011552247132704770

Statutory safeguarding guidance here: www.gov.uk/government/publications/working-together-to-safeguard-children--2

RedHoodGirl
It's true that some parents are not supportive of their children. The problem is that trans training is ignorant of safeguarding in schools and tells individual teachers to keep a child's disclosures - whereas teachers are taught to always share disclosures within the school - then a decision will be made about talking to parents by the safeguarding lead.
You can find awful examples of this in some of the the GIRES training materials. Schools manage this balance all the time and our safeguarding legislation is predicated on working in partnership with parents.
In order to remove parental rights / responsibilities, authorities have to go to court. Trans groups are the only ones to recommend removing parental rights in this way - thus leaving this group of vulnerable children alienated from their families and not safeguarded by their schools. And which group of adults benefits from that?

I can understand where children who are at risk (ie those living in potentially abusive households, are involved with drugs / criminal activity, are at risk of sexual exploitation) might need to be flagged by schools - with information confidentially held by a safeguarding officer and divulged on a ‘need to know’ basis to key teachers etc. However, these are situations which the parents are already likely aware of (if not directly, they’re potentially part of the ‘problem’)? A pupil telling a teacher in confidence that they think they are struggling with their gender identity / think they might be trans / are trans is hardly the same thing. There is no risk to the child in divulging that, and it would be a serious breach of trust and potentially dangerous to pass that information on to their parents.

In the same way that I wouldn’t expect a teacher to tell parents if their child had come out as gay to them (in confidence), I wouldn’t expect a teacher to break a confidence and tell the parents they said they were trans. Obviously if the child has come to the teacher to ask for support in telling their parents, that is a different matter.

It’s similar principles that therapists adhere to with minors. They make it very clear at the beginning of any counselling that everything discussed between the therapist and the child is confidential and that the ONLY time that confidence would be broken is if the child indicated they would hurt themselves or others.

Let’s imagine that a teacher DID break a confidence and tell a child’s parents that they had been told by the child that they were trans? While I’m sure everyone here would react calmly and in a measured way, not all parents would. Imagine if that news meant the child was physically beaten by the parent? Subject to psychological abuse? Subjected to some religious ‘cure’ therapy? Kicked out of the house?... How is the school to know which parents might react like that, and which wouldn’t? In a large secondary school where parents often don’t meet the teachers (especially in households which might already be less engaged with their child’s wellbeing), it’s a huge risk.

Because teachers can not predict how parents will respond and because questioning your sexuality or gender identity is not a danger to life (or significant physical welfare) of the child or others, it is considered a safeguarding risk to TELL parents and is not considered a safeguarding issue in itself.

These are the guidelines that are currently adhered to within schools. Hopefully my explanation above helps explain why that is the case.

RedHoodGirl what safeguarding training and experience do you have?

Please see this and other threads by someone who has a good professional understanding of safeguarding, particularly if vulnerable children: mobile.twitter.com/mrkhtake2/status/1011552247132704770

It explains the safeguarding red flags in regard to advice in packs and such as Red’s above. School guidance should not be being written by lobby groups at all, let alone those who either don’t understand or ignore established safeguarding practice.