“Outing” and “Transphobia”: Informing a parent that her child was being “socially transitioned” by a school/college

How many hoops should a person who has concerns jump through and how many miles of red tape should they wrap themselves up in, when a child needs protecting.

How were parents evenings going to work?
What about if there was an emergency? School phone you and leave a message on your mobile to say John has been taken to hospital when you have a Shelia?
Is every member of staff supposed to know mum doesn’t know and hide one name from her and know the other?
Madness.

I'm still waiting for an explanation as to why the college had the authority to undermine the parent's parental responsibility.

Apart from the rest of the illustrated risks here, the college was denying the child the opportunity to access professional clinical advice.

The college failed to query the reasons behind the child's desire to transition.

They' failed to raise that safeguarding concern. With parents and professionals.

They're not qualified to make those decisions because it's now been well established that there is a high number of gender confusion amongst children who've suffered trauma, sexual abuse and have been groomed online.

I completely fail to understand why the college decided to keep it a secret. And I fail to understand how anyone who describes themselves as "GC as they come" doesn't understand this.

So pleased to see a scold back. Missed you! Surely the tribunal will decide if this was whistleblowing, and who best followed Safeguarding and guidance? I think Steve took a principled decision, and will therefore be willing to contribute to his costs. I am absolutely appalled that a college with a duty of care to a vulnerable disabled child could believe that facilitating a false belief that people can change sex, and keeping a massive secret from parents was in this child’s Best Interests . Had a risk assessment been carried out? Would this girl be sharing toilets/ changing rooms with boys? Residentials? It seems incredible to me that this should happen. But we know that this is where wholesale acceptance of the trans narrative has got us. This man has been sacked, Sandie Peggie was suspended for being unwilling to undress in front of a special sort of man. I am glad that the courts will decide what is reasonable in these situations. Thank you for your courage, Steve.

Exactly and safeguarding is everyone's responsibility.

doesn't make him qualified in safeguarding to be making disclosures to parents.

So it was a safeguarding disclosure then?

What's the reasoning to not share with parents?

If you're not sharing a disclosure with parents you should be calling social services/ police instead. As in the case of FGM disclosure. Immediately phone police.

There's no reasoning behind keeping a disclosure a secret.

It puts staff and the child at risk

I don't know if this legally makes a difference I am wondering OP:
Were you personally asked to lie to the parent and said no, this is counter to safeguarding I can't do that. Or did you not normally have reason to interact with the parent and just looked up their contact details and called them in a whistleblowing kind of context?

I am as GC as they come but you have no idea of that child’s specific background circumstances and whether that child had more issues going on that you didn’t know about. Unless you were the DSL, you should not have done this. By all means, complain, raise with head, governors etc, that the child’s parents should be told, but I think you should absolutely be fired for doing something you were explicitly told not to do.

That vulnerable child is at risk but it isn’t from the parents.

IMO telling the mother of the unlawful actions of the college, regarding a matter concerning the welfare of her child is a bona fide act of whistleblowing.

Which is what he did.

A whistleblower can, depart from any policy or procedure they regard as unreasonable, unlawful, or places a person at risk of harm.

And they can blow the whistle to whomsoever they consider appropriate.

He had no right to decide he was entitled to be the person to "put her in the know" when he isn't qualified to make that assessment.

The college aren't qualified to make an assessment to socially transition a child without professional and parental involvement. The mother has parental responsibility, not the college.

Where in kcsie does it say that schools and colleges have the right to socially transition children without parental consent?

It says the opposite.

The college clearly failed to communicate effectively what proper procedures were to be followed

That's on them. He shouldn't loose his job for their failures.

It's very much the same in the sense he was still "putting the mother on the same foot as everyone else" in a way that was completely out of line with his role. He didn't have a place or role within the school to do that, so it really doesn't matter whether he was disclosing a child was socially transitioning or was gay or had an abortion - he's been fired because he doesn't understand this boundary and didn't follow the guidance to raise his concerns. He had no right to decide he was entitled to be the person to "put her in the know" when he isn't qualified to make that assessment. Reading the KCSIE guidance (not very well since he didn't follow it...) doesn't make him qualified in safeguarding to be making disclosures to parents.

Read the guidance and read the bit around raising concerns then tell me he followed the guidance...

If you followed it why don't you mention escalating your concerns to the local authority safeguarding like the guidance tells you to?

Not sure about the age thing but a vulnerable 16yo girl is different to a non vulnerable 16yo girl isn't she. So surely those rules would be mooted by that fact maybe 🤷

rather than following the guidance he keeps harping on about then he has completely failed in his duty. OP is only required to follow the guidance and escalate or whistleblow as indicated, that is his duty of care,

Which he did.

Explain why he and the mother are a risk to the child.

The risks for the child regarding social transition are outlined in Cass and in the guidance for gender questioning children, which I've summarised upthread.

There is only postulated risk to the child around reasoning to keep secret.

it very much sounds like senior leaders agreed to transitioning the child, so safeguarding should have also discussed the referral with them. It clearly also fell on deaf hears thereafter.

Doesn't sound like you or the college are aware of the latest guidance.

And if they were, they would have had a policy in place to follow.

Which would have been constructed around the gender questioning guidance as directed by KCSIE

The mad thing about this, as Steve himself points out, is that everyone in the college knew the child was socially transitioning. It was hardly a secret, and there's a reasonable chance that the mum would eventually have found out anyway. All that Steve was doing was putting the child's mother on the same footing as everyone else. It is not at all the same as informing the mum of a private disclosure, such as the child saying they were gay or had had an abortion.

If you really think that school staff disclosing to parents anything about a child they personally feel should be disclosed, rather than following the guidance he keeps harping on about then he has completely failed in his duty. OP is only required to follow the guidance and escalate or whistleblow as indicated, that is his duty of care, he should never ever take action himself where he is completely unqualified to do so.

Yeah so he didn't escalate in line with kcsie if he wasn't happy with safeguarding a response then.

Don’t you mean took it upon herself not to understand statutory safeguarding guidance. 😆

he completely failed in his duty to protect that child

That's a stretch

Where is that on the crowd funder?

He reported to safeguarding