Schools ‘let pupils switch gender without informing parents’ - Policy Exchange Report

[rogdmum]

There’s a raft of coverage in the Times and the Mail today:

<a class="break-all" href="https://archive.ph/2023.03.30-014418/www.thetimes.co.uk/article/schools-let-pupils-switch-gender-without-informing-parents-pppbphkgq?shareToken=a982976ca8c81a3e9ea0e21ee76f3364" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">https://archive.ph/2023.03.30-014418/www.thetimes.co.uk/article/schools-let-pupils-switch-gender-without-informing-parents-pppbphkgq?shareToken=a982976ca8c81a3e9ea0e21ee76f3364

Half of schools turn to outside agencies for sex education:

<a class="break-all" href="https://archive.ph/2023.03.30-015239/www.thetimes.co.uk/article/half-of-schools-turn-to-outside-agencies-for-sex-education-zzqqsmgb0?shareToken=111ada6e40d464c85ba4f6d11703fbd8" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">https://archive.ph/2023.03.30-015239/www.thetimes.co.uk/article/half-of-schools-turn-to-outside-agencies-for-sex-education-zzqqsmgb0?shareToken=111ada6e40d464c85ba4f6d11703fbd8

The magnificent Rosie Duffield:

<a class="break-all" href="https://archive.ph/2023.03.30-015234/www.thetimes.co.uk/article/rosie-duffield-schools-are-failing-in-their-duty-to-protect-gender-distressed-children-9zzsk06j9?shareToken=fbad1f25d0a39dad9cb1bc35292664d7" rel="nofollow" target="_blank">https://archive.ph/2023.03.30-015234/www.thetimes.co.uk/article/rosie-duffield-schools-are-failing-in-their-duty-to-protect-gender-distressed-children-9zzsk06j9?shareToken=fbad1f25d0a39dad9cb1bc35292664d7

Rosie nails it:

”Iis universally accepted that safeguarding is fundamental to a responsible society. These principles are well-established, enshrined in law, and applicable to all organisations and functions relating to children. There is never a good reason why safeguarding should be compromised, especially within school, where children spend the majority of their time outside of the home environment.”

”The rising number of children reporting gender distress, and the treatment of those children within clinical settings, is rightly being given the attention it deserves. In an NHS-commissioned independent review, Dr Hilary Cass found the Tavistock clinic to be adopting an “unquestioning, affirmative approach” without exploring other factors causing these children’s distress.
Affirmation as a one-size-fits-all solution has been discredited.

Thankfully, the clinic is being shut down. However, Policy Exchange has revealed something even more concerning: the same approach is being facilitated in schools, which breaks every safeguarding rule in the book.”

Someone was asking about this report being from a right wing group and how to frame it with their schools. This is our response to that criticism: https://twitter.com/SafeSchools_UK/status/1641376013320957952?s=20

If we sound cross its because we are.

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Keir Starmer responds:

"Keir Starmer says schools "need and want guidance" on trans issues: "I think it's very concerning to see that different schools are doing different things.

"And I think parents would want to know what's going on. I think that's understandable. And I say that as a parent myself.""

twitter.com/dominicpenna/status/1641405403559870464?s=46&t=WHoOZ_3Kv5G6-FyQuvE0LQ

Glad you’re feeling better @rogdmum . I’ve read your posts over the years and you have been a fantastic advocate for your child and children more generally.

Thank you to @2fallsfromSSA and everyone at SSA too for your work on this.

For us in education and health professions who are worried by the affirmation only approach it’s a real relief to see this being discussed more openly.

Ducking the issue as ever.
Look at the responses under that tweet! Not one of them with a clue about children - and all ignorant about safeguarding, throwing around right wing tropes and allegations of bigotry amongst parents.
Incapable of reading or engaging with the issues. So depressing.

Rachel Reeves. Doesn't answer whether she'd be happy being kept in the dark, says Labour have been calling on the government for months to publish the guidance. Have they? Does anyone have a link?

twitter.com/timesradio/status/1641342711637704704?s=46&t=WHoOZ_3Kv5G6-FyQuvE0LQ

On the BBC:

www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-65127170

"Rishi Sunak has promised schools will receive guidance on policies for transgender pupils for the summer term.

The Prime Ministerr_ intervened after a teaching union said its members were navigating a 'minefield' around gender."

I'm not sure he "intervened after" a union had something to say though.

Sectors like education and health aren't directly managed in every detail by government. They are mostly run by civil servants. There are thousands of people involved at different levels.

In part, there is distance on purpose, it is supposed to protect them from too much political interference. But it also means that structurally, they can avoid taking on government direction very effectively, for a long time, if they don't want to.

And they have been very effectively taught by "expert" organizations, by the media, and by their own training, to accept these ideas wholly, and think that they are morally obliged to stand up for them. People right down to the classroom level.

It takes a long time to make change in this scenario and I would even say that unless there is a lot of pressure applied steadily, often the organization wins out. There needs to be continued pressure from government on this and efforts to change thinking, and it will likely take as long to undo as it has to get here.

After Tania Carter spoke on LBC, there was a woman who just talked a load of bollocks. Trans children are 10 times more likely to commit suicide, etc.

And a drama group teacher who said she wouldn't tell the parents of any children who wanted to identify as the opposite sex because she thinks they need 'breathing space' in a safe environment. The utter cheek of it. Fortunately Shelagh Fogarty said that was a safeguarding risk and she wouldn't let her child anywhere near this woman.

There's this wholesale assumption that every single parent of a child who is gender confused is a raging transphobe.

Actually, they're being told that anyone who disagrees with you is your enemy.

The government must get hold of this. It's a horrible, insidious lose/lose situation. If concerned parents don't want their children going down a path that can lead to irreversible surgery, they are automatically the enemy. And adults who should know better, who should have safeguarding training which tells them this is wrong, are going along with it.

Tanya said there is online influence, and the interviewer assumed she meant social contagion. But it's not just that. It's being told that everyone is against you, including your parents. Look at that fucker Jeffrey Marsh.

It needs to be made an offence not to tell the parents.

I think it's worth adding the front page of today's Daily Mail for additional context/info here too.

It's the UK's biggest paper so it's important that a headline front page like this is furthering visibility. Even without reading anything past that headline, thousands and thousands would have seen those words as they passed newspaper displays in shops and garages etc today.

Sunlight, visibility and awareness.

A new, related story:

EXCLUSIVE: School record-keeping system now allows teachers to add pupils' pronouns - and students can choose to identify as 'they', 'Zie', 'Sie', 'Ey' or 'E'

www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-11920889/School-record-keeping-allows-students-identify-Zie-Sie-Ey-E.html

"England's largest school management system, ESS SIMS, covers thousands of children.
The pronouns teachers can choose from include the traditional 'he' and 'she' but pupils also have the choice to identify as 'they', 'Zie', 'Sie', 'Ey', 'Ve', 'Tey' and 'E', the Mail can reveal.
The discovery has sparked fresh fears that the controversial 'gender identity' theory feared to be endangering child welfare is now being normalised in schools.
Released in the summer of last year, guidance for ESS SIMS users says pronouns can be chosen by 'pupil/students, applicants, contacts, staff members and agents'.

Once applied to an individual on the system, their personal pronouns are then displayed in bold at the 'top of their record' for those who use the system to see.
The 'management information system' is the most widely used in UK schools and claims to be installed at '19,000 schools, with 1 million users from over 40 countries'."

Quotes from Conservatives for Women and WRN:

"Caroline Ffiske from Conservatives for Women told the Mail: 'In the wake of the Policy Exchange report some people are asking just how gender ideology has become so normalised and widespread in our schools. The fact that one of the major pupil data management systems used in our schools - SIMS - promotes gender ideology and normalises the use of made-up neo-pronouns for school children gives you an indication.'

She added: 'In the introduction to their YouTube training module, SIMs say the new pronoun option is 'based on customer demand'. Of course we know it is not. It is based on the demands of a small number of gender activists.
'Ideological demands are made - and another corporate falls into line, unable to ask itself some basic questions about science, safeguarding, free speech or to think through the harm done if you affirm the idea that children can be born in the wrong body.
'For schools, we urgently need the now long-promised new government guidance on these issues. But the private sector also needs to ask itself - will it defend science, reason, free speech - or continue to bow to harmful ideology?'
Heather Binning, of the Women's Rights Network, added: 'We have alerted MPs time and time again to the fact that schools and teachers are socially transitioning children without the knowledge or consent of parents.
'This is a serious risk to safeguarding. It usurps parental authority and responsibility.
'It is a direct breach of statutory duties as regulations require schools to register the name and sex of every child.'"

And:

"The Department for Education was contacted for comment."

This happened to me with my daughter. I won't go into details but it has been horrific and now we are estranged

I listened on and off to LBC and was frankly quite shocked at how many were saying that schools should not tell parents. Sheila was very clear in her views on this however I didn't hear anyone ask what 'living as a boy/girl/woman/man means. The kiwi woman whose child was a trans man and now 21 wound have been a great candidate for this question.

Additionally there now seems to be an acceptance of 'lots of genders' and you must have a gender. Well some of us don't have a gender - I hope this is being explained to children.

IMO any school affirming this nonsense without telling parents should automatically be downgraded to special measures there is nothing complex about this, it's very straightforward and it's completely different to a child being gay.

Jesus. I was under the impression that the government had unequivocally said you cannot teach children things that are unevidenced.

Neo pronouns are based on an ideology that is unevidenced.

Are there really soon they don't care about that, because of fucking customer demand? If you went on customer demand, you wouldn't even have any schools.

cosmiccosmos · Today 18:28
"I listened on and off to LBC and was frankly quite shocked at how many were saying that schools should not tell parents."

Yes, it's frustrating, hearing all the TRA tropes coming out. But, the one massively good thing is, at least we are all now having the conversation.

No debate is well and truly over.

My fury with schools is somewhat tempered by the knowledge that Ofsted signed up to Stonewall some years ago and followed their demands to prioritise teaching about gender identity. They're now doing a hasty reverse ferret (not admitting their culpability) but they, the NAHT (head's union) and the DfE have all pushed this at schools. They threw money at Stonewall and other very dodgy groups. Schools just assumed that this is the new upside down clown world where fetishes & science denial are celebrated and vulnerable children affirmed in their fantasies. Many of them accepted it and stopped all critical thinking.

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-10931423/Ofsted-cites-lack-gender-identity-teaching-primaries-factor-inspection-reports.html

There will be something else again in a few years, unless they are punished individually. The lesson they need to learn this time, is that each individual will be punished. What's the point in a serious case review, it will show like others they put themselves and the institution first, I want to see each individual with FII behind bars.

We are talking fabricated induced illness here, it's a criminal offence.

It's like bankers, maternity, blood and the post office scandal, the people who harm are always protected, they never get punished for destroying lives, just sweep it under the carpet and tax us more.

The NHS needs to rewrite the description as it's quite a widespread problem with those in the public and third sector.

www.nhs.uk/mental-health/conditions/fabricated-or-induced-illness/overview/

I can confirm that Sims has a box which says 'preferred pronouns (school use only)' on student records. I may be paraphrasing slightly but that is the basic statement. A box written into school management software that explicitly states its information to be kept from parents.

There's a screen shot of the pronouns in school thing here:

twitter.com/anniesarboretum/status/1641510990431805460?s=46&t=WHoOZ_3Kv5G6-FyQuvE0LQ

More news

www.telegraph.co.uk/politics/2023/03/30/rishi-sunak-orders-independent-review-of-sex-education/

"An independent review of sex education is set to be ordered by the Prime Minister, amid growing frustration with the Education Secretary.
The Government is scrambling to respond to mounting alarm among parents over the teaching of sex and gender in schoolss_.
Rishi Sunak is now preparing to announce as soon as Friday that an independent panel of experts will lead a review of sex education lessonss_, taking over work already started by the Department for Education (DfE), The Telegraph understands."

And:

"Senior government figures are understood to be concerned about the Education Secretary's “soft” approach to transgender issues. They cited her remarks earlier this year when she suggested that 16-year-olds are old enough to decide to change their gender.
Her comments came after Mr Sunak blocked a controversial Scottish self-ID Billl_.
Downing Street is also understood to be concerned that the DfE has been overly influenced by trans activists, and fear the Education Secretary has failed to act quickly enough to recognise the political importance of addressing parents’ concerns about sex education and transgender pupils in schools.
“Downing Street officials have not been shy to express their bewilderment at DfE’s approach to these issues which has left the Government exposed on an issue it should be owning,” a Whitehall source said.
On Thursday, Mr Sunak was forced to intervene over demands for transgender guidance in schools, which has stalled under a succession of education secretaries, including Mrs Keegan, who had said it would be published early this year."

More on Keegan:

"It is understood that she will review the recommendations of the independent panel of experts on sex education."

And a statement in her name this time:

"In a statement, Mrs Keegan said: “Policy Exchange’s report is deeply concerning and further demonstrates why we are taking decisive action.
“I am urgently bringing forward fresh guidance for schools to make sure they are equipped to support children, keep them safe, and are using teaching materials that are genuinely age appropriate.
“I am clear that parents should have access to teaching materials used for relationships and sex education and that they should be involved in decisions about their children.”"

This is the pack provided by the vale of Glamorgan. Powerless as a parent springs to mind! https://participate.valeofglamorgan.gov.uk/draft-transgender-inclusion-toolkit

They seem to have dropped the idea that the guidance will first be issued for consultation no mention of it in the press coverage today.

I've never known of any education guidance being issued without consultation before? It so often changes when practitioners get hold of it - but this is a self inflicted emergency I suppose.
Trouble is everything that's written about trans issues in schools comes from very self interested adults, enforced with the threat of tantrums if it's not immediate affirmation of children.

This Times article says there will be a consultation and that schools should act on a case by case basis:

https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/36190c3a-cf3d-11ed-9a78-fca06b87e87b?shareToken=d9200db9346732e018f0928e3a6133ea