Telegraph: parents blocked from seeing content of RSE lessons (School of Sexuality Education again plus Mermaids)

[ResisterRex]

Telegraph reports that the ICO has stopped parents being able to see the content of RSE lessons:

"Parents have been forbidden from viewing the content of sex education lessons urging children to become transgender allies, the Information Commissioner has ruled.
Material aimed at children aged 12 and above provided by The School of Sexuality Education (SoSE) includes links to Mermaids, the controversial transgender children’s charityy_, and a seven-minute video urging students to become “trans allies”."

The School of Sexuality Education is involved in the material:

"The SoSE, which provides workshops on “consent, sexual health, porn and positive relationships” through the viewpoints of decolonisation and inclusivity, was hired by Hatcham College to deliver Relationships and Sex Education (RSE) sessions."

https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2022/10/07/parents-blocked-checking-childs-trans-sex-education-lessonss_//_

The School of Sexuality Education has been discussed before on MN:

to ask if your child’s school is on this list?
http://www.mumsnet.com/Talk/amiibeingunreasonable/4531448-to-ask-if-your-child-s-school-is-on-this-list

And the former Minister said parents must be able to view materials:

"As their children’s primary educators, parents should be given every opportunity to understand the purpose and content of what their children are being taught. In the RSHE statutory guidance, which all schools must have regard to, we have set out a clear expectation for schools to share examples of resources with parents."

View the Hansard contribution by Mr Walker on Thursday 30 June 2022 hansard.parliament.uk/Commons/2022-06-30/debates/B651E0B9-ADA2-4A7A-A9AD-8F9A2D5BC5FC/BACKBENCHBUSINESS#contribution-799E25B1-8F02-4D32-B91F-48FC4591DD0F

Link here too

twitter.com/japanesepolar/status/1578503910070755328?s=46&t=Y9ua0eDhsZXQcWxm5oTOGQ

The journalist's thread includes some slides of what was (is?) being taught:

twitter.com/stevenedginton/status/1578494097685258240?s=46&t=WbpVA_FViPGNoGo0JdIMZg

So now we have to hope some bright kid does the lessons, secretly records them and leaks them to the press?

Well that's, ummm, interesting.

Do the ICO think kids never speak to their parents about what they learned at school today? Or show them the hand-outs?

This just waves huge red flags doesn't it. Part of the whole 'no-one but us really understands you' bilge being pumped out. Ugh.

Why is it commercially sensitive for them but not for eg the AQA exam board to share their courses?

I've seen the screenshots. They're teaching an ideology

I'm confused what this has to do with the ICO? I thought they oversee data protection, and I can't see how this is relevant. I can't read the full article behind the paywall - anyone know?

From the little I could read, it sounds like the ICO have ruled that schools don't have to share, rather than insisting that they mustn't share - which makes it sound as if someone referred the matter to them, and they've kind of washed their hands of it?

You can see the article in the second link, where there's a link(!).

This feels like an overreach on the part of the ICO to me. How are they empowered or equipped to know what's "obviously inappropriate"? That's not their job. They're not in charge of education:

"The Information Commissioner decided that while there is a public interest in <a class="break-all" href="https://archive.ph/o/gZAeV/www.telegraph.co.uk/family/schooling/should-choose-child-learns-sex/" rel="nofollow" target="blank">parents knowing what children are being taught in sex education classess, none of the materials were “so obviously inappropriate as to justify over-riding the Trust’s duty of confidence”."

This might be a glimmer of hope but why should any parent have to take annual leave to go and view this stuff? The answer would be to rule somehow that schools may only enter into these contracts with a clause stating they will share all the materials:

"A spokesman from the Department of Education said: “Schools are legally required to engage with parents on the teaching of relationships, sex and health education.
“We are writing to all schools this term to emphasise this and to make it clear that if a parent requests to see teaching materials, copyright law does not prevent a school from sharing them with parents in person on the school premises.""

My guess is that the parents put in a request to the school for copies of the teaching materials, citing the Freedom of Information Act. The teaching materials were not the intellectual property of the school, they were the intellectual property of the commercial provider which the school brought in to deliver the lessons. The school would have had to ask their commercial supplier for their views on the request for the material to be shared. The commercial provider would have objected to this. The school would then have declined to supply a copy of the material, using one of the exemption in the FOI Act.

The parents will then have escalated to the ICO. The ICO’s job is to check whether bodies covered by the FOI Act are implementing it correctly, i other words if a body relies on an exemption in the FOI Act to decline a request the ICO will check that the exemption was applied correctly.

The way around this would be for DFE to say to schools that parents have a right to see material being given to children as part of sex and relationships education, and that in future, if schools are commissioning external providers to deliver such lessons then the school’s contract with that provider should make that clear. The provider will then have a choice as to whether they are prepared to receive payment for the lessons, on the basis that parents will have access to the materials. If they are not happy with that p, then they find some other org to pay them for their work instead.

I really wish we could stop out sourcing sex education.

No one seems to check the contents and any approval from educational bodies seems to be reason enough to not bother checking.

Everyone thinks someone else has done the checks and its down to parents to try and get to the bottom of things.

The sheer number of people so happy to take on the responsibility of " educating" children on this stuff should be alarming enough in itself and cause head teachers to be a bit more wary.

Any thing from anyone who says dont tell parents should be destined for trash can fire not the classroom.

And the worse thing is there's no accountability. Everyone can just blame everyone else theres enough distance at every level for plausible deniabilty.

Totally agree with that, whatwould

I worked with a child in a residential placement for children with problematic sexual behaviours i.e too risky to be in mainstream school or foster placement. For various reasons the therapy team at the home began working with him on this, helping him explore his "gender identity". They refused to show what they were doing on the grounds it was commercial property and they had signed a contract saying they wouldn't share it with anyone. I insisted and in the end they gave me a breakdown of the sessions but no actual material. What I saw seemed nonsensical for children with such complex, risky behaviours and traumatic history. Like the trans "child" debate more generally it was informed by its own ideology rather than by existing knowledge of child development, trauma and best practice.

Then time to withdraw the child from school during those timetabled slots. And bring on the court action.

Compulsory sex ed was not set up in order for outside agencies to exploit the opportunity to fill children up with partisan political propaganda.

I think we are in a vicious circle right now. The more responsibilities schools are forced to take on that would previously be down to parents ( peope can no longer afford to have a parent at home. Parents are forced to work shifts where they probably barely even see eachother to collaborate on who's done what ), the less time teachers have to spend on teaching. Meaning they probably jump at the chance to be able to have someone do various aspects for them. The more that is required , the more people will set up organisations to cover it all. The more organisations pop up the harder its gonna be to vet them. This can only have one outcome.

ANY teachers or scheme of works or lesson plans that providers are wanting to be kept from ANYONE is a red flag.

I do wonder what the fuck schools think they are doing.

Thanks ResisterRex and LoobiJee. I didn't realise the ICO oversee FOI as well. I completely agree with PPs that say that any sort of confidentiality shouldn't be allowed in these contracts.

@AlisonDonut You're right of course. Anyone who says "I'm going to teach your children something about sex, but I'm not going to tell you what" should be politely shown the door.

... scratch that - no politeness is required for that sort of person/organisation.

That.

The only reason an adult has for not wanting a child's parent in the room to know what they intend to say or do with their child, is the adult knows the parent would not consent, and would present a boundary to protect their child from it.

Flat out safeguarding red flags, front and centre.

One of my children's schools is in bed with Stonewall and Diversity Role Models (look the latter up, it's quite the eye opener).

When I requested the material, it was exactly the regressive, sexist, harmful ideology nonsense I feared. The teacher in question is swimming in the Kool Aid.

Worse, it's endorsed by Barnardo's!

When I complained to the head, citing why the material was factually incorrect, harmful to females and politically driven, he conflated sexuality with gender and more or less accused me of homophobia!

Why are these materials being kept secret if there's nothing to hide?

Also endorsed by Barnado's...

www.barnardos.org.uk/news/joint-statement-barnardos-nspcc-national-childrens-bureau-and-childrens-society-about-gender

...and the NSPCC, and the Children's Bureau, and the Children's Society...

I actually get really sick of the immediate jump to homophobia. Families /people are actually allowed to not believe in gay relationships. They obviously aren't allowed to abuse or treat someone differently and poorly as a result of their sexuality/gender identity but its not a crime in itself to have different opinions on lifestyles. I would hope bullying would he taken seriously and any actual homophobia dealt with.

But we have gone beyond just trying to teach children to be civil/polite/kind to people and have gone full on brain washing instead.

Our kids don't actually have any obligation to believe and externally display allyship and try and compete to out do eachother on acceptance.

Would it be lovely if everyone could see two mums or two dads and see it as normal . Yes of course. But do we have the right to force that belief on others to the point where its not actually enough to just carry on treating them perfectly normally as they would anyone else ? No i don't think we do.

I dont think its actually solving any issues . Its just creating an environment of fear where everyone's compelled to think and act a certain way and nothing is ever enough.

Its a massive over step imho

In fact dd says it makes every thing worse.

Not only do the lgbt kids get lost in some.race to the bottom automatically assuming they are gonna get thrown out/beaten, no one cares about anything else. Which pisses off the kid's who aren't lgbt because they Arent afforded the same levels of concern. The punishment for any form.of homophobic bullying seems to be worse than the punishment ls for anything else

Shed actually rather be called names fir being gay because least something gets done about it. Not so much when she has stuff thrown at her or gets barked at on a regular basis.

This

As a homosexual female I am beyond sick of being used as a human shield to justify unleashing whatever inappropriate adult agendas on kids without interruption from common sense or safeguarding. It is not innocent.

You know what? If it's a choice between homophobia and this? I'll take the homophobia. I really will. Call it social responsibility and call it self preservation. Because if this is allowed to be shoved on further until something even worse hits and the general public really produce a backlash? Every letter under that rainbow is going to be dragged down anyway.

Do not teach inappropriate secret content to kids in my name and expect me to shut up about it in the name of my own self preservation. Because I won't.

The resources we got on the 'LGBTQ: what it means' material, which is part of the 'Real Love Rocks, by Barnardi's 2017' included:

Homosexual.- this might be considered a more medical term to describe someone who has an emotion romantic and/orvsexual orientation towards someone of the same gender.

Intersex - a term used to describeca person who may have the biologicalbattributes of both sexes or whose biological attributes do not fit with societal assumptions about what constitutes male or female. Intersex people can identify as male, female or non binary.

These are just 2 examples. I asked what's medical about being homosexual?
Intersex does not mean you are both sexes and it's nothing to do with societal assumptions.

Oh, and the Y8 quiz asked 'Do you think the figure for Trans young people who have attempted suicide is higher or lower than LGB people?'

The answer is 'higher. It' 48%, Note: LGBT young people who experience homophobic, biphobic or transphobic bullying are much more likely to attempt to take their own life than LGBT young people who aren't bullied'.

I asked where the research was.