Working Group - KCSIE 2026 changes - improve the guidance via the consultation process, promote more responses & more

253. In making decisions about supporting social transition, schools and colleges must comply with their distinct but interacting obligations under safeguarding legislation and equality and human rights law, ensuring that any assessment of discrimination is informed by their evaluation of the welfare and best interests of the child and other children.

Thoughts: This should be clarified. “In making decisions about how the school will support a medically indicated social transition in partnership with the child’s medical team and parents …”

Schools should not be making decisions about supporting social transition, they should only follow the instructions of a child’s medical team -

I think, now, a case can be made that it is not simply ‘kind’ to use a child’s preferred pronouns but actually something that should be treated with caution.

I don’t think the same case can be made for adults who have expressed a desire to be referred to by wrong sex pronouns?

Convince me that it isn’t the polite thing to do and that misgendering isn’t rude. Talking purely about pronouns here, not access to single sex spaces. Imagine it’s a colleague.

249. Schools and colleges should consider adopting policies across school and college life that maintain flexibility and avoid rigid rules based on gender stereotypes.

Thoughts: Yes. This could do with emphasising. Gender stereotypes should not dictate what any child can and cannot do/wear at school.

251. Schools and colleges should not initiate any action regarding social transition; this guidance applies where a child or their parent has made a request. Members of staff should not adopt any changes relating to social transition unless a decision has been made by a school or college in consultation with parents or carers.

Thoughts: This is better than paragraph 246 but surely the decision should not be made by school or college at all? No action should be taken unless the child in question is under medical supervision and then only to follow the direction of the medical team?

248. Schools and colleges should take time to understand the thoughts and feelings of children who are questioning their gender and should be appropriately professionally curious about the full range of the child’s experiences. Schools and colleges should remain aware of the potential vulnerabilities of children who are questioning their gender, including the possibility of complex mental health and psychosocial needs, for example relating to relationships with family, peers or their broader social environment, including discriminatory bullying.

My thoughts: why should schools get involved with the thoughts and feelings of children? This seems like it is giving permission for teachers to coach children into an ideological way of thinking. Schools and colleges should surely liaise with parents if any concerns about the safety of children arises?

Sorry the embedded links have gone haywire, they should be:

Cass Interim Report
Cass Final Report
The new Finnish study

246. It is not for schools and colleges to initiate any action in this area; this guidance is focused on circumstances where a child or their parent has raised a request relating to social transition to which a school or college is responding.
My thoughts: I don’t think this is clear enough. The first clause is OK but schools are in no way qualified to respond to a request to socially transition a child without following clinical guidance from the child’s medical team.

There are a great many ideas about “gender ideology” that have permeated the UK’s institutions, including schools, that indicate pretending a child is the opposite sex is the “kind” thing to do. However, the evidence of recent years suggests that there are risks as well as potential benefits to social transition and that it may have significant effects on psychological functioning.

Supporting a social transition without clinical guidance may not be kind for the child requesting the social transition, their peers or teachers/staff who are being asked to take on a clinical function without the requisite training or expertise. This should be made clear in para 246.

• cass.independent-review.uk/home/publications/interim-report/" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">Cass Review Interim Report p62 “it is important to view it [social transition] as an active intervention because it may have significant effects on the child or young person in terms of their psychological functioning.”
• Social transition concretises an idea that previously resolved in the vast majority (approximately 66-95%) of cases (see Cass Review Final Report p67)
• There are risks to social transition (beyond concretising) cass.independent-review.uk/home/publications/final-report/" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">Cass Review Final Report p164 “This [advising on the risks and benefits of social transition as a planned intervention] is not a role that can be taken by staff without appropriate clinical training.”
• Results from a Finish Registry study published in April 2026 showed: “Those [Adolescents and Young Adults] referred after 2010 had greater psychiatric needs than earlier cohorts, both before (47.9% vs. 15.3%) and ≥ 2 years after (61.3% vs. 14.2%) referral.” It concluded: “Severe psychiatric morbidity is common among gender-referred adolescents and appears to be more prevalent in those referred after the recent surge in referrals. Psychiatric needs do not subside after medical gender reassignment.”

I've just started going through the new KCSIE section on gender questioning children line by line. I've hit a snag in the second paragraph. IMO it does not go far enough. It seems to state schools shouldn't initiate a social transition but its A-okay if requested by a child and or the child's parents. I don't think schools should be asked to (or volunteer) to support social transition without clinical advice from the child's medical team.

Clearly the waiting lists are a problem in taking this approach but it can't be schools that step in here as the risks are too great. (I know teachers are expected to step up for all sorts of areas they are not qualified to do - several teachers in my family) but I think we have the evidence in this case that doing so could be detrimental.

I will post the para and my thoughts / evidence selection in the next post (as it's long! sorry)

I think you're right about politeness here. But fear of getting it "wrong" does also stifle critical thinking. So it's effectively a double whammy:

Polite desire to get it "right" + fear of getting it "wrong" = acquiescence to the rules gender identity belief

The custodians of "right" and "wrong" are the gender identity believers. Everyone else is perceived or framed as heretical and/or too ignorant to understand. It's the Emperor's New Clothes writ large.

The fear of social ostracisation (and worse.... see Bash Back's threats) is as much a powerful motivator as any genuine desire to be kind. More so sometimes.

That applies to any toilet design. Teachers can’t be on toilet duty all the time. Toilets that were large single sex rooms with cubicles were also not safe.

Lock the toilets at lesson times to solve that problem and all hell breaks loose.

Schools cannot win.

The general public is constantly being told that it's transphobic to use sex-based pronouns.

I don’t think it’s even that. Not a fear of getting it wrong, more a desire to get it right. The general British public are quite obliging when it comes to preferred manner of address, e.g. Dr, Sir, Dame.

You just need to refer to them as “preferred” pronouns and manners will do the rest.

Although I don’t think that would apply to weird pronouns like zie.

We've had a block of unisex toilets (the rest single sex) for years so toilets have never been an issue.

Depends on the issue.
With respect, you have been lucky that there have been no known incidents that you have had to deal with in the unisex toilets, presuming they are full floor-to-ceiling ones. If you have a look at Everyone’s Invited you will see what women talk about has happened inside their school premises, sometimes years later, discussing it for the first time. Unfortunately all the recent fatalities that I know the toilet design of in uk schools, it has been a floor-to-ceiling private design. This is not to say it would have made any difference to the outcome in these cases - but it did in the situations I confronted.

Would I have wanted to use unisex toilets on my period and wash my hands next to a boy? No, I would have always used the girls or, on heavy days, abstained from school if there was no choice of toilet. I had to spot wash my skirt more than once. Unisex toilets take provision away from girls.

Toilets in schools are never safe. We have teachers 'on guard' outside our single sex toilets as well as our unisex ones. And CCTV pointing at the doors.

CCTV is useful to look back on when things went wrong and someone tells you things went wrong. You can’t have someone watching cctv on the entrances to toilets, or toilet doors all day.

Toilets are really difficult to get right design-wise in schools. The unisex one was traditionally by the entrance, opposite the reception desk.

The general public is constantly being told that it's transphobic to use sex-based pronouns.

Whether it is or not is open to debate. TBF I think the general public is pretty confused on whether it is or not and seems to be slowly coming up with a rule book that makes no sense e.g. it's not transphobic to say "he" for Isla Bryson but it is for Hunter Shafer. It's ok to refer to drag queens as "he" when they aren't in drag but it has to be "she" when they are.

So yes, unfortunately I think you're right that the general public isn't "with you on this one". Pronouns seem to be the front line of the battle for Kindness and Respect.

Avoiding them entirely (when someone has preferred pronouns that differ from their sex) seems to save a lot of time IME. I appreciate that approach will annoy people on both sides of the debate, as it were.. but I can't really afford to worry about that when I'm focusing on keeping my daughter safe.

It sounds like some aspects of gender identity belief are being kept in check, but others are not.

"Toeing the line" legally here is very much open to (nefarious) interpretation.

If a school has accepted a child or a staff member as the opposite sex, because their passport says so, then they may well argue that the child/teacher has a right to use the facilities of the opposite sex. Obviously they may not, and it's likely to be the 'rabid TRA' type of influential leader who pushes hardest here.

But that's only a small part of the picture. There is plenty of legal wiggle room for schools to be a part in a child's journey towards medical transition. Children who go on to have medical interventions are way more likely to do so after they have left the school. But the impact that schools can have to validate this demand pipeline can't be understated. Any adult who takes part in a child's social transition is a part of that affirmative journey. Adults in school more so, because there is a perceived authority here, from students and parents.

We have quite vocal parents so I think my school is more likely to carefully toe the legal line to be able to head off complaints in either direction regardless of personal opinions.

Perhaps the vocal ones who demand that adults and children affirm their child's will be placated, by the school teaching everyone that it's important to be kind and respectful by using preferred pronouns?

No, it fudges it. It kind of suggests that misgendering might be bullying, and that staff and kids who don't want to use preferred pronouns might consider using names instead, but it is not clear about anything.

Thank you. This is better than nothing. I use names instead and have made it clear to staff that this is because I won't be a part of any child's social transition. I've asked them to look at the KCSIE guidance (from 2024 and 2025) and how it refers to the Cass Report... which states that social transition is not a neutral act. It's very clear that there is a lot of cognitive dissonance going on amongst the staff on this point. The apparent "neutral" position they've settled on appears to be that if the parents are on board, everything is fine and dandy. And... round and round we go, with a top-down culture of "kindness and respect" (that is actually more akin to authoritarianism), staff telling everyone why it's so important to validate everyone's gender identity... and lots of other things besides. I imagine it would be impossible for any staff member to question any of this up the chain.

you call someone who's black 'black' or someone who's white 'white' that's an observation, it's not a slur. Using correct pronouns is the same for transpeople, it's simple material reality. It's really not offensive. There are transphobic terms, correct pronouns are not.

I don't think that the general public is with you on this one.

They started being introduced a few years after that article and now an estimated 25% of schools just have variations on this design. Ironically, some schools now have to barrier them off or have teachers on guard. Toilets are always going to be trouble spots but private cubicles are not safe. We need as few as possible.

Toilets in schools are never safe. We have teachers 'on guard' outside our single sex toilets as well as our unisex ones. And CCTV pointing at the doors.

@BonfireLady Given (I expect) there will be children at your school who identify as the opposite sex or as non-binary, the safeguarding angle of this should be crystal clear - so that all staff understand the risk that vulnerable children may end up believing they are in the wrong body and may enter an affirmation pathway towards medical transition

I'm not sure if we've ever had any children who have had any sort of medical intervention (puberty blockers/cross sex hormones). My school is in a bit of a backwater so we've never had huge numbers of trans kids, generally maybe a handful out of over a thousand kids and those numbers are dropping, not increasing. Parents have always been involved with any that I have taught. We've had a block of unisex toilets (the rest single sex) for years so toilets have never been an issue. No one has ever been allowed to use the wrong sex changing rooms, I think there is a private option. So while no, I don't know the head or DSL's personal opinions on trans matters, I've never been given any reason to think that they are rabid trans activists forcing girls to undress in front of boys or similar. We have quite vocal parents so I think my school is more likely to carefully toe the legal line to be able to head off complaints in either direction regardless of personal opinions.

Are there teachers in your school who share preferred pronouns in their emails or have "LGBT"/"LGBTQ+" posters up in their classrooms?

Not that I have seen.

Additionally, there are autogynophiles to consider. If you were on a school trip with a male teacher (who identified as a woman), would you feel comfortable letting that teacher wander around the girls' residential accommodation alone?

We don't have any trans teachers but I don't think that would happen at my school.

I can't remember if the KCSIE guidance makes it clear that nobody needs to use preferred pronouns but thank you for reminding me to look.

No, it fudges it. It kind of suggests that misgendering might be bullying, and that staff and kids who don't want to use preferred pronouns might consider using names instead, but it is not clear about anything.

Once upon a time (well 2000) the Government vetoed unisex floor to ceiling cubicles with shared washbasins due to religious reasons.

The Department for Education and Employment said they violate the regulation that pupils aged over eight must not wash their hands together.

The male headteacher arguing for his new £35k unisex toilets said that ‘Pupils were consulted, and it was felt that a mix of girls and boys would help to lessen aggression and vandalism.’ (Not sure the girls suggested being bad behaviour shields and mini-police?). ‘He dismissed fears of sex sessions, suggesting that pupils would seek somewhere more comfortable’.

https://www.theguardian.com/uk/2000/dec/05/education.schools

The safeguarding risks, and defying religion as a protected characteristic, were obvious from the start.

The Department does not collate the location of deaths (thankfully rare), sexual assaults and rapes in schools. If they did, they may have already seen a pattern in ‘disabled’ toilets, depending on if (mainly) girls reported assaults at the time. Ten years ago, Parliament discussed sexual abuse in school premises and it was recommended that data should be collected and collated centrally. Ofsted asked them several years later too.

No one has ever been able to give me a risk assessment or equality impact assessment on these mixed sex, private cubicle designs in schools (I have asked DfE, police, fire, RSPoA, Government departments, manufacturers). They started being introduced a few years after that article and now an estimated 25% of schools just have variations on this design. Ironically, some schools now have to barrier them off or have teachers on guard. Toilets are always going to be trouble spots but private cubicles are not safe. We need as few as possible.

It’s taken 20 years to sort this out.

What a good discussion. This is also my experience of numerous schools with a range of faith groups in their schools. They operate with care and skill to ensure that no groups are allowed to influence school practice for their own religious or political interest.
The requirement to share PSHE materials with parents will be helpful. Again too many age inappropriate, politically motivated, porn soaked materials have been produced by the usual suspects - hopefully the the sunlight of publicity will ensure that these disappear.
These are tricky issues to navigate and it's a shame that genderism is still being allowed to influence policy to the extent that aspects of KCSIE may allow trans extremism to continue in some schools.

It does sound like your school is fully on top of this. Partly thanks to "belief wars":

I understand that some of the parents from these groups made it fairly clear that their religions did not go along with the fantasy of pretending sex isn't real and they saw being taught genderism as fact as a direct assault on their religious beliefs.

To be fair to the gender identity believers, the parents' religious beliefs may also be perceived as fantasy. However, this is the key bit:

The way the school manages religious differences also laid bare quite starkly the coercive demands of the genderists - they were expecting everyone else to show obedience to their religion when the other religious groups would be accommodated in their religion but no other children were expected to follow their traditions / beliefs / language conventions.

Expecting others to demonstrate the tenets of a belief that they don't hold is a hard no. Where it has a safeguarding impact, that no should be even harder. There are plenty of examples where it is e.g. FGM and underrage marriage being illegal, where it relates to religious or (most) cultural practices. Where FGM relates to the culturally-led practices of gender identity belief it isn't.

Sunlight, basically. (and a good safeguarding culture trying to build trust with parents rather than the opposite / keep secrets).

This is key.

Thank you for your response.
Unfortunately your school sounds like it's got the potential to be just like the one my daughters go to. A few red flags:

I have literally no idea what my head or DSL's current opinion on trans matters is, and certainly not my chair of governors.

I should imagine most teachers at my daughter's school have no idea either. It took 3 years and some unpleasant experiences for me to find out all of that. Given (I expect) there will be children at your school who identify as the opposite sex or as non-binary, the safeguarding angle of this should be crystal clear - so that all staff understand the risk that vulnerable children may end up believing they are in the wrong body and may enter an affirmation pathway towards medical transition (perhaps with their parents' support). I can see why you wouldn't know the head of governor's position on this but the head's and DSL's should be clear.

We don't have any written policy.

Neither does my daughters' school. They also don't follow the current KCSIE guidance on this. They told me they don't need to. I expect they'll start following it in September 2026 (after my daughter has gone) but will be making full use of all the loopholes and will be continuing on with the practices I listed in the examples above. Are there teachers in your school who share preferred pronouns in their emails or have "LGBT"/"LGBTQ+" posters up in their classrooms?

I don't know if they'll even mention the trans stuff given that it's in part 2 and the general assumption is all that sort of thing happens behind the scenes and whatever the current government rules are will be followed.

Obviously I'm not a teacher at my daughters' school. But I can well imagine that this describes things there. When it is mentioned (in materials that get used in classes) it is always within the context of kindness and respect. The kindness and respect of (actively) using preferred pronouns etc. By implication, children are being told that anything else is unkind. I've been told by my own children that it's unkind and disrespectful that I don't use people's preferred pronouns, even when I point out that I'm being respectful by not using any pronouns at all. The school has drilled this into them so well that they don't seem to recognise that it's unkind and disrespectful to me to expect me to pretend that I believe everyone has a gender identity.

This doesn't mean that the same translates to adults transitioning.

Whilst anyone over 18 has more freedom to make permanent choices about their body, that doesn't mean they're not vulnerable. Also it doesn't mean they won't regret it. Doctors don't tend to allow women to have hysterectomies until they are in their 30s because they recognise that women might regret an early, irreversible decision.
Additionally, there are autogynophiles to consider. If you were on a school trip with a male teacher (who identified as a woman), would you feel comfortable letting that teacher wander around the girls' residential accommodation alone?

I know that many on here's preferred option would be that children are not told anything about trans at all in case it puts ideas in their head. However, gender reassignment is one of the protected characteristics in the Equality Act that we have to teach children about.

Children can be taught about the PC of gender reassignment without being told they need to act as if people are the opposite sex. In the most simple terms, it means that any male who identifies as a girl/woman (and any female who identifies as a boy/man) should be treated no less fairly than one who doesn't.

How to square that circle? Teaching kids not to be racist, homophobic etc, but deliberately misgendering a trans person is now fine?

What is "deliberately misgendering"? In the vast majority of cases, anyone at school who has a transgender identity won't even be present when sex-based pronouns are used to describe them. Do you think staff be telling other staff and children to use preferred pronouns in this scenario? If so, that's coercion. It's also coercion if the child is present.

This is outside the scope of KCSIE.

I can't remember if the KCSIE guidance makes it clear that nobody needs to use preferred pronouns but thank you for reminding me to look. The draft gender questioning children guidance certainly did say this. Hopefully that's been transferred across to KCSIE. It's a fundamental part of safeguarding that everyone knows what sex people are. Coercion to use preferred pronouns reduces this because it can lead to confusion. Not always. Some people use them but can clearly separate out a person's sex from this without cognitive dissonance. However, as an example, staff (who I have spoken to... carefully) and children at my daughters' school appear to be very confused about the sex of one of the teachers. This teacher is male, is referred to as "she" and goes on residential school trips.

As well as just being quite good on safeguarding and understanding what it really means, I think partly why the SLT in my school is so good on this is because they also have a number of religious groups within the school. I understand that some of the parents from these groups made it fairly clear that their religions did not go along with the fantasy of pretending sex isn't real and they saw being taught genderism as fact as a direct assault on their religious beliefs.

And I'm not sure how clearly it was articulated, but some of these religions do mandate single sex spaces so it may have been the case that children from these faiths would have been excluded if the toilets / changing rooms were mixed sex (even by stealth).

The way the school manages religious differences also laid bare quite starkly the coercive demands of the genderists - they were expecting everyone else to show obedience to their religion when the other religious groups would be accommodated in their religion but no other children were expected to follow their traditions / beliefs / language conventions.

Having said all that, part of the reason why the parents knew that a few years ago there were some genderist teaching materials slipping in is because the school publishes all PHSE / RSE resources online for parents to look at. Sunlight, basically. (and a good safeguarding culture trying to build trust with parents rather than the opposite / keep secrets).

How to square that circle? Teaching kids not to be racist, homophobic etc, but deliberately misgendering a trans person is now fine?

Using correct sex pronouns (and normal English) is not offensive nor transphobic. It's part of the coercive control and abusive element of trans ideology that frames it that way. It's analogous to recognising the ethnicity of someone. It's an observation not a comment or slur based on that observation.

If you call someone who's black 'black' or someone who's white 'white' that's an observation, it's not a slur. Using correct pronouns is the same for transpeople, it's simple material reality. It's really not offensive. There are transphobic terms, correct pronouns are not.

Framing a neutral fact-based normal English usage observation as offensive all the time and trying to get children to believe that too is emotional abuse as defined in KCSIE. Apart from anything else even the most signed up to gender woo person cannot keep it up with the wrong-sex pronouns. As has been demonstrated repeatedly in the highly controlled environment of a court of law. Just imagine trying to keep it up day to day if it's impossible in that setting.

One of the most unforgiveable things about this ideology is creating divides between loving parents and children. I have with my own eyes seen the look of fear and horror on a parent's face when a correct sex pronoun slips out. It damages both child and parent mental health. It's unforgiveable that many children have been groomed into thinking parents don't love them if they can't keep up the wrong-sex pronouns because no-one can. Parents who would do anything for that child and yet are framed as evil monsters for not being able to totally rewire their brains and the way they use English for a child they gave birth to and know the sex of.

It's also not kind to tell children that other people won't notice basic observable facts about them like their sex.

From your experience as a teacher, do you see a top-down leadership culture (in at least 2 out of the head, DSL and head of governors) that fully understands this issue and how it can be mitigated at a whole-school level? If so, I imagine the KCSIE guidance will work in your school. If not, I would be very wary of what these gaps can lead to.

@BonfireLady honestly, at my school I have literally no idea what my head or DSL's current opinion on trans matters is, and certainly not my chair of governors. We don't have any written policy. I am extremely interested to see what the training on KCSIE will be like in September, I don't know if they'll even mention the trans stuff given that it's in part 2 and the general assumption is all that sort of thing happens behind the scenes and whatever the current government rules are will be followed.

coercion that stops children understanding what biological sex means and why it can be important to know this.. "it's important to use someone's preferred pronouns as a sign of respect"

This is where people are going to part ways. Ok, so children transitioning is problematic, we have evidence of potential harm and it should be treated with caution. That's about keeping children safe.
This doesn't mean that the same translates to adults transitioning.
I know that many on here's preferred option would be that children are not told anything about trans at all in case it puts ideas in their head. However, gender reassignment is one of the protected characteristics in the Equality Act that we have to teach children about.

How to square that circle? Teaching kids not to be racist, homophobic etc, but deliberately misgendering a trans person is now fine?

This is outside the scope of KCSIE.

Thank you @womendeserveequalhumanrights I truly hope that there are more schools like yours than the one my daughters go to, if your SLT has got a grip on this.

I think the main thing that will turn this around is people losing their jobs over safeguarding failures (such as forcing girls to strip in front of boys in order to prop up an unscientific and illogical adult ideology).

Agreed.

A DSL, for example, does need to be held to an appropriate professional standard and this has not yet happened. Hopefully soon.

Agreed.

In the meantime, it's really important to shore up as many loopholes in the next release of KCSIE as possible. Unfortunately there will be slippery DSLs (and others in the two key 'triology' roles I mentioned above) who know how to weave their way through the existing laws and aren't being held to account by the DfE, Ofsted or local MPs. Safeguarding at a whole-school level seems to slip into an accountability black hole, with every person and organisation in the chain able to point to it sitting with someone else. The OP's previous threads demonstrated this very well.

Hopefully the OP's legal action will provide a focus on such slippery behaviour and could make other SLTs in schools like my daughters' take note. (Although in my daughters' school's case, I suspect they will just find the next nefarious agenda, as per your comment above, if there isn't a personnel change).

If the OP's legal action continues on to court, it will expose a significant part of gender identity belief for the safeguarding failures that it leads to. It will bring the topic of children who believe themselves to be the opposite sex into much sharper focus because very few people are likely to support sexually mature males (with penises) getting changed in the same changing rooms as girls... so will start asking more questions about why it's being allowed to happen. It probably won't address/expose autogynophilia, as the heterosexual teenage boys who are involved are arguably too young to fully understand what they are being drawn into (by the adults who are grooming them), but AGP is slowly being publicly exposed in other ways.

Perhaps enough of the public will start joining the dots and will force all of this out into the open🤞🤞