Teacher made to apologise - “good afternoon girls”

[MrsMurphyIWish]

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-11976891/Female-teacher-forced-apologise-saying-Good-afternoon-girls.html

I’m a teacher and I have to apologise to a student for inadvertently calling a student by birth name and not chosen name. (Was early in school year and was calling the register in auto pilot). Had email from pastoral about how upset I had made them feel. I fell on tenterhooks round this student - especially at parent’s evening and reports as their parents are unaware so I have to use birth names. This is the worst that’s happened to me - I really feel for this teacher.

2 + 2 = 4. Even if one of those number 2s really, really feels like a 3.

This is disgraceful.- both the OP’s experience and the fallout from “good afternoon girls” as described in the news article. Teachers can’t be treading on eggshells, terrified to even greet their class in case they slip up. They’ve got enough on their minds trying to do the brilliant job that they do each day to educate our kids! Why are the kids suddenly in charge? And why are teachers expected to remember all the new names and pronouns and never, ever get it wrong?

I would be horrified if my child had socially transitioned at school without my knowledge. I would feel betrayed by the teachers. Parents absolutely need to know, unless there’s a child protection issue.

Re the article: A class of girls in a single-sex school is a class of young biologically female humans. Some of these girls may have a gender identity as a trans boy or non binary person. That doesn’t make it ok for a teacher to be hauled over the coals for saying “good afternoon girls”. They are still biological girls.

What an Orwellian nightmare this is becoming. Something’s got to give!

It should’ve common sense that information is only withheld where there is an actual risk.

In social care parents are always informed of information, eg a child’s disclosure, or referral from another agency- unless it would place the child at risk of harm. The neutral position is to inform parents and this only doesn’t happen if there is specific risk to the child of informing the parents.

It ridiculous to withhold information from parents without there being evidence concern of harm. If there are so many parents out there who are a risk to their children surely the schools should be contacting social care about these children.

I feel so sorry for you, why are teachers forced to accept this evil make believe? No wonder teachers are leaving

My stepdaughter was transed at school and we’re still deciding as to whether to take it to court or not.

Sadly I think we will only see meaningful change when parents take schools to court.

Must be hard to stand out against it.

I don’t think the public realise properly how powerless individual classroom teachers are in school and how very much more difficult senior leadership can make what is already a difficult job. It’s strange how many senior leaders in schools seem to actively dislike classroom teachers and support staff and actively undermine them, especially with regard to unworkable behaviour policies that put all the onus on the teacher and minimise the role of SLT.
There’s a weird tendency for schools to jump on whatever the latest educational or social fad, fancy or bandwagon comes by and impose it willy-nilly on everyone. When it’s just brain gym or learning styles the waves of nonsense generally retreat leaving only useless paperwork washed up on the shores of the curriculum. But the constant forced the acceptance of all this rubbish slowly erodes critical thinking, and the propensity of schools to fall back on rigid thinking means that genuinely damaging stuff like genderism can easily take hold.

Quite.

If there is genuine concern re: telling parents them school must kick it up to social services to investigate- you can’t just secretly trans a kid at school and not tell the parents because a) the parents WILL find out and it will be in a far less ideal situation than a meeting at school (eg another parent will mention it in Tesco or it’ll be through the schools crappy comms systems and b) gender distressed kids are at high risk of self harm and not telling the parents is akin to expecting them to parent with one hand tied behind their back. If the kid is at risk of self harm the parents need to know*

*when my eldest was at risk of self harm CAMHS told me to get a lock fitted to a kitchen drawer or buy a secure lock box. No razors could be left in the bathroom, no knives in the kitchen and all fire sources had to be locked away too. It’s irresponsible for schools not to share information with parents when a child’s physical well being is involved. See also, binders and grey market hormones.

If she were my bio daughter it would’ve been filed already, but her mum (who speaks English as an additional language and has been falsely accused by the school of importing homophobia from her birth country!) is understandably reticent.

The school is a hotspot for it, thanks to two particular members of staff (a counsellor and a deputy head).

Quite! They are a horrendous organisation to work for and I think the teacher has had a lucky escape!

It's all very confusing isn't it, we can't use collective terms for people of one sex anymore.
But an apology is right. It doesn't matter if a parent knows, children have the right to chose their gender and pronouns. The teacher in the article had too fixed views and should not win the case.
Ref a change of name, that's a bit tougher. This is what I found https://childrenslawcentre.org.uk/faqsyp/can-i-use-my-chosen-name-pronouns-in-school-and-get-my-school-records-changed-to-reflect-my-new-name-gender/#:~:text=Your%20school%20should%20respect%20your,other%20staff%20members%20know%20too. It doesn't look like a child has a right to be referred to by a different name without parental agreement, but a schools decision. You were right to apologise, but should have apologised at the time.

Why do I keep reading the news when I find the insanity of humanity so stressing?

Not remotely connected to the story in the OP, nor my family situation, but this phenomenon has been around in certain girls schools for ages, this news story from 2018 was part of my school peakening.

(school is well known locally for having had previous issues with social contagion of eating disorders and self harm/cutting)

https://www.mirror.co.uk/news/uk-news/top-girls-school-bans-staff-11826983.amp

This is appalling, the hypocrisy is even worse - the face that the parents are kept in the dark whilst the teacher is asked to apologise.

https://www.gov.uk/parental-rights-responsibilities

Schools should not be making that decision!

When the child is 16 they have a right to change their own name via deed poll without parental permission but the parents still need to know as they will need to ensure the record matches with HMRC (child benefit is payable until 19 if the child is in full time education).

Activists are painting parents as abusive to justify removing parental rights and keeping secrets.
I just want to point out this is the opposite argument to the one they use about retaining single sex services, where they say people should not be considered a safeguarding risk until proven otherwise.

A report in the Sunday Times today says the DfE is about to issue guidelines saying schools must inform parents if their child is socially transitioning at school.

I don’t know if even individual court cases will stop it and the damage a court case could wreck on an individual family is immense.

My daughter’s former school is undergoing an external investigation after what they did to us. Even now in the full knowledge of the damage they caused, they are doubling down and saying it’s just fine for them to change name/pronouns from the age of 12 where the parents are unaware (attached from their submission to the investigation)

Dibbydoos you say above "children have the right to chose their gender and pronouns"

What law underpins that right? Where has this right come from?

Surely the problem is lobby groups or peers telling children that they have this absolute 'right' at an age when they have very little personal agency. It's not surprising that 11 year olds who don't get to decide what to have for breakfast or what time to go to bed use this to control the adults around them.

Exactly. School should apologise to teacher and tell parents what they are up to. Parents would be well advised to remove daughter from a school that thinks it is ok to lie to parents.

It’s a fucking nightmare @rogdmum 😥

My DsD’s school tried to justify the same using ‘Gillick Competence’ as an excuse. We asked for a copy of the paperwork used to determine said ‘Gillick Competence’ and the name and credentials of the professional who made the assessment and they had to back down because of course no one professionally capable had made any official determination.

England not Scotland though.

Gender ideologs can't have it both ways, they can't say trans teeens are at greater risk of suicidal ideation and then say that you can't tell parents that their child is at risk. Who is looking after these fragile minds during the holidays and evenings/weekends? Leaving the kids half social transitioned and no secure sense of self.

It is utter madness to do this behind parents backs even if the school is bought into genderism. If the child is in danger of physical or psychological abuse at home then creating a secret identity at school isn't helping them at all.

The psychological pressure of leading a secret double life which could be exposed must be immense. Particularly when the school have confirmed your worst fears that your parents can't be trusted with this information.

Utter, utter madness.

Absolutely this. The girls in the class are actually girls, no matter how they identify. They are not males and never will be.

Schools have been quietly reinforcing 2 + 2 is 5 but shh don’t tell the parents

I’m so depressed by this. It is an Orwellian nightmare