"They can request another space"

[BlackAlys]

Still reeling after an inset day talk on Diversity and Inclusion. The group delivering the 2.5 hour long class showed us a video of a trans girl, primary age, happily playing with friends and their parents saying how wonderful it all was.

This very feminine looking transgirl has, in my Headteacher's mind, become the poster child who represents all children who are transitioning and he has now proclaimed a push for all trans pupils to be allowed to toilet, change, swim, play with wherever they are comfortable.

Before now, our teenage trans pupils have been offered an individual changing area/toilet cubicle for their modesty and dignity. It's worked. We don't have trans girls...yet.

I run residential trips tied to my subject area and asked about the sleeping arrangements, should the situation arise. The Headteacher now feels that a transgirl should be able to share dormitories and changing areas with girls and trans is to share with the boys.

I pointed out that our pupils with strong religious faiths will not be able to/wouldn't want to; also that the vulnerable girls with haunted pasts won't want to; I pointed out that, bottom line, we have sex segregation for a very good reason and the very basic right of dignity and privacy should be respected. I asked him how that will be navigated and he replied that if a girl objects, then she can sleep/be catered for elsewhere.

It's gutted me. Girls, move out if you don't like it.

I pointed out that Sex is a protected characteristic and he shrugged and said that we have to evolve with how society is changing.

I asked him how his daughter would feel about his desire to throw her rights to privacy away, and he told me she'd be fine with it.

He's seen had heated the story of the little transgirl and he is utterly captured.

I know my card is now marked and am wondering how I'll be treated upon my return.

It's gutted me. Girls, move out if you don't like it.

Aside from the particular issue you raise here - what an appalling attitude to teach girls by the HT - they don’t matter, another child matters more than they do.

Schools should be teaching the exact opposite to girls by both words and deeds.

What do parents think? If this was at my DC’s school, I would be livid and would certainly make a complaint

Still reeling after an inset day talk on Diversity and Inclusion. The group delivering the 2.5 hour long class showed us a video of a trans girl, primary age, happily playing with friends and their parents saying how wonderful it all was.

Parents and teaching staff need to start investigating the credentials of outside organisations running Diversity and Inclusion training in schools. Many are misrepresenting the law and have a poor grasp of Safeguarding responsibilities and child development.

Schools are required to provide sex segregated toilets for children over the age of eight, so it really doesn’t matter what he thinks, he has to follow the law.

despite having the frightening statistics of unwanted sexually attention and, even rape and assault in schools

Could you show him the "Everyone's Invited" website?

Are there girls who could organise a girls' strike?

Could you insist on an Equalities Impact Assessment? Is there someone in your LA or Ofsted who could assist?

Bloody men - they have no skin in the game, and Just.Do.Not.Get.It.

@HermioneWeasley

Schools are required to provide sex segregated toilets for children over the age of eight, so it really doesn’t matter what he thinks, he has to follow the law.

Hermione, how do so many new builds get away with the unisex toilets? My DD's comprehensive are unisex with a communal circular washbasin area in the centre. DD's hate it.

Why is it only women and girls who have to move over and "be kind"? Why are men so damn keen to give away the few boundaries we have and think they're being so goddamn chivalrous in doing so?

Because they will have been stonewalled! They will have had stonewall telling them that mixed toilets are fine and misrepresenting the equality act. It’s only when they’re challenged with the actual law that they start to realise...

how do so many new builds get away with the unisex toilets? My DD's comprehensive are unisex with a communal circular washbasin area in the centre. DD's hate it.

Most schools have not being adequately challenged. At some point Ofsted is going to recognise the issues however they too have been Stonewalled.

There are reports of challenges by pupils and/or parents resulting in changes.

@HermioneWeasley

Schools are required to provide sex segregated toilets for children over the age of eight, so it really doesn’t matter what he thinks, he has to follow the law.

However, as I understand it, the actual regulation says:-

Separate toilet facilities for boys and girls aged 8 years or over must be provided except where the toilet facility is provided in a room that can be secured from the inside and that is intended for use by one pupil at a time

Advice on standards for school premises For local authorities, proprietors, school leaders, school staff and governing bodies This is a pdf

So, as I understand it, where there are separate rooms for each toilet (in the same way that disabled toilets often are in eg shopping malls) then that is lawful but, if it's simply a case that an existing single sex space with cubicles in it has been repurposed for mixed sex then that is unlawful.

Why are men so damn keen to give away the few boundaries we have and think they're being so goddamn chivalrous in doing so?

The current orthodoxy is that right thinking, modern and progressive females do not need boundaries and do not want them either.

It's idealistic, naiive and wholly uninformed about the realities of being female. Plus the current seeing of the complications of female people as unfashionable and unwanted.

Have a faith or culture or trauma that presents a boundary to positive, inclusive mixed sex provisions? Get over it! Ditch it! Disability? er.... well, never mind....

Its all very high on what is actually very male centric and naive theory, and shiny advertising, while low on practicality, reality and any actual inclusiveness and tolerance and diversity. And as usual, the people making the decisions won't be the people suffering the realities of naive, ill informed outcomes and producing the serious case reviews that change the policy.

Remember the evidence that people have been sent out to train these policies as the right way forward who have been found by inquiry to be not just without training but proven unable to understand safeguarding, or to have lost posts due to actions incompatible with safeguarding. Passion and good intentions are lovely, but there are kids to be thought of here, and adults have to do the foreseeing and protecting for all of them, however they identify.

Also very important to keep reminding those making policy: a serious case review will establish, in detail:

did you fail to ask the difficult questions?

did you fail to 'think the unthinkable'? ie to think about potential worst outcomes, what happens if people don't respond and behave in the way that you hope?

were you more concerned with sensitivity or not rocking the boat and then having to face up to upsetting some parties involved than in making a thorough, impartial assessment that considered safeguarding the vulnerable parties?

Ofsted involvement and names on reports mentioning such failures are awful, awful things because safeguarding fails are awful things. The job must be done properly.

Further to my post above, the actual regulations concerned with separate toilets that you need to quote are:-

Regulation 4 of the School Premises (England) Regulations 2012, which falls within the exemption provided for in Schedule 22 of the Equality Act 2010 that says that it's ok to discriminate on the grounds of sex if you are required to do so by an Act or Regulation.

www.legislation.gov.uk/uksi/2012/1943/regulation/4/made

I'm with SSAUK. Apologies, I have not read the thread but just been alerted to it. We have lots of information on our website to help parents with regards to RSE teaching, safeguarding policies and toilets:

safeschoolsallianceuk.net/resources-2/factsheets/
safeschoolsallianceuk.net/resources-2/letter-templates/

This definitely warrants an official complaint and whistleblowing to OFSTED. @BlackAlys if you want to email [email protected] we can give you support.

And this at a time when hundreds of girls are saying very loudly that they are not safe from boys in schools, and cataloging everything that boys and men do to make them feel that way. So the response is to make female only facilities mixed? Really bad timing.

Alongside telling the girls to move over, it can't be particularly safe to put transboys in with the boys on residential visits etc. The boys will know that they have a biological girl with them and groups of boys have been known to egg each other on to behave inappropriate ways or worse. Talk about painting a target on the transboys back.

Aside from all the points already raised in this thread I am stunned that a high school head teacher can be so easily captured and ignore the most basic safety and security needs of his students. Its terrifying really.

I recently watched the BBC series Football's Darkest Secrets, well I watched one episode and had to take a break. Serious sexual exploitation of young boys on an industrial scale for years because the people in charge were seduced by very sophisticated manipulators and even the most basic, common sense safeguarding measures went out of the window.

Now I imagine that the vast majority of children who identify as trans are not a danger, but the fact that this HT has been so easily swayed is a huge concern to me. I'm sure he is a lovely man and a great teacher but he sounds quite gulible and that is a dangerous trait in someone with such a high level of responsibility and accountability.

Just adding this resource here for anyone who needs to complain to their school: safeschoolsallianceuk.net/2021/04/16/how-to-complain-to-your-childs-school/

Unisex toilets are generally ok. A unisex toilet is a fully enclosed toilet with a sink inside. Like disabled toilets.

Single single sex toilets are cubicles with shared sinks for one sex only

Mixed sex toilets are cubicles with shared sinks for everyone.

Placemarking.

Having an issue not with school, but with an external provider (activities, residential trips). Single sex facilities promised on application form, but from reading their policies, clearly this is not the case. Wondering what legal requirements are for such providers, and whether/how they differ from those for schools. Wil have a look at the links posted here.

This might help Novina

New resource from SSAUK: how to complain! www.mumsnet.com/Talk/womens_rights/4223690-New-resource-from-SSAUK-how-to-complain

I realise this is for an external provider but it might form a complaint.

Thanks, OhHolyJesus

I'm still fencing with them via email, but also gathering together evidence to hold them to account. The enraging thing us that, most parents will send their kids off with the assumption if single sex facilities, when it's a total lie.

Apols for typos

SSAUK also has some guidance on toilets: safeschoolsallianceuk.net/resources-2/factsheets/

If you search the site for "toilets' you will find all kinds of helpful info:
safeschoolsallianceuk.net/?s=toilets

@SciFiScream

Unisex toilets are generally ok. A unisex toilet is a fully enclosed toilet with a sink inside. Like disabled toilets.

Single single sex toilets are cubicles with shared sinks for one sex only

Mixed sex toilets are cubicles with shared sinks for everyone.

There are at least 5 new build schools in the 2 different authorities that I've visited through work And they are all mixed sex toilets.

Everyone calls them unisex toilets because the doors are floor to ceiling, but the sinks are shared in the middle of the room.

My own DD's hate them; the lack of privacy is a huge issue.

Sorry for the lack of communication- it's been utter chaos with my Year 11's since we re started. Going back over everyone's advice now and I think I will be getting in touch with a few posters on this thread.