Single-sex schools can reject transgender pupils

[IwantToRetire]

A Department for Education source said: “Single-sex schools can refuse to admit pupils of the other legal sex regardless of whether the child is questioning their gender.”

Schools will be reassured that they will not be breaching the Equality Act 2010 if they do so.

Teachers will not be required to call children by their preferred pronouns, the source said. There is no suggestion that a child who is questioning their gender identity would be forced to leave a single-sex school.

The guidance on transgender pupils is being drawn up by Gillian Keegan, the Education Secretary, and Kemi Badenoch, the equalities minister. It will apply to all state and independent schools in England.

It is intended to provide clarity on how schools respond to children with gender dysphoria and comes amid a dramatic increase in the number of pupils who say they are trans.

In 2021-22, the NHS reported more than 5,000 referrals to the Gender Identity Development Service run by Tavistock and Portman NHS Foundation Trust, up from just under 250 a decade earlier.

A recent report by the Policy Exchange alleged that the practice of affirming pupils questioning their gender in schools has become embedded.

Long article originally from the Telegraph available via Yahoo News https://uk.news.yahoo.com/single-sex-schools-reject-transgender-210826905.html

(I am wondering whether this flurry of articles in the Telegraph about schools and gender ID are as much about the Government trying to find out what sort of response they would get if actually put forward as a proposal.)

The teacher, who asked to remain anonymous to protect the pupils, said she was made to stand to one side as the head of year addressed the pupils saying "no one here would want to hurt you".

Addressing the children on her behalf, the head of year said "I am sorry you're upset", explaining "no one here would want to hurt you" and "you're all really loved by us".
The teacher feels she was then "managed out" by senior staff who refused to extend her one-term contract at the school, which is part of the independent Girls' Day School Trust.

https://uk.news.yahoo.com/teacher-said-good-afternoon-girls-233852801.html

Crikey it’s all happening. Must be elections coming up or something.

Which strongly suggests that extreme gender ideology, once spelled out, is pretty unpopular with the electorate, especially the schools stuff.

Which FWR has been pointing out for many years - if you have a debate, the public will see clearly what it is being required to believe. And they won’t like it.

What a sensationalist and ideologically odd thread title.

Single sex schools are single sex and remain so under a specific provision of the equalities act that it is not discrimination to have a facility or service that is reserved for holders of a particular protected characteristic.

Single sex schools take pupils of one sex. They admit pupils of that sex regardless of whether they identify with culture's sexist stereotypes about their own sex, whether they prefer to live according to the sexist stereotypes about the opposite sex, whether they reject both baskets of stereotypes and actively seek a middle way or whether they don't think about it much and just want to get on with getting their GCSEs.

No child is being rejected from any school because of being trans. They will not be eligible to apply to schools reserved for the opposite sex to their own and it would be very poor parenting for the parents of any young person who identifies as trans to ever put in such an application in the first place so the schools should never be put into the position of having to respond to an application from a child whose sex doesn't match the sex for which the school exists. Youngsters of course don't need to have a matching gender identity, or indeed any gender identity, so there will usually be a proportionate number of kids who identify in these ways at any school including single sex schools.

@KaihahUmoniiv Newspapers have reported that seminars for school governors have previously advised that schools would be on shaky ground if they rejected transgender students.

I know of a case in front the courts at the moment regarding this exact issue in Australia.

I don’t think this thread is sensationalist or ideological at all. I wish that more people shared your view of sex though.

My daughter’s single-sex school has a trans ‘boy’ (i.e. a girl) at it.

Obviously she is actually a girl, so she’s entitled to be there.

Odd though, that someone who says they’re a boy and identifies as a boy would want to be at a single-sex girls’ school…… 🤔

The thread title appears to be the same as the Daily Telegraph title, sensationalist & ideological or not.

Matrix Chambers (bunch of lefties, iirc) are disagreeing with this interpretation and still saying 'ooh no, schools can be sued for not accepting opposite sex trans children'.

It's the Equality Act 2010, not the Equalities Act.

But I am very glad to see adults entering the classroom again.

There is such a shortage of teachers. HTs should be supporting their staff. I am sure the teacher in question will be able to get a job elsewhere.

Interesting.

Well Matrix Chambers are talking out of their arses. Fortunately they are not responsible for making the law.

There are, quite rightly, no under 18s with a legal gender recognition certificate that requires them to be treated as their acquired gender, but even if ther were the equality act allows GRCs not to override reality if there is a legitimate aim and single sex education is a legitimate aim.

Therefore no girls' school could successfully be charged for failing to admit a male pupil who feels like a girl because that feeling has no status in law. A girls' school certainly could be challenged for discrimination against a female pupil who identifies as a boy, and many indeed have a number of such pupils who do so. Refusing to admit on the grounds that the pupil is trans would be discriminatory.

If a school admits both male and female pupils who identify as the opposite gender then there's no sense at all in asserting that it's a girls' school, it's clearly a mixed school whatever your ideology about which of these categories count as girls, you can't have both, you must pick one and exclude the other or become a mixed school.

If a ruling was made in favour of Natrix Chambers position that would effectively outlaw single sex education.

That sounds very promising.

If this makes it in to the final guidance, it will be a huge step forward for safeguarding.

The compassion that is needed to help students who are having crises (anorexia, gender dysphoria or other) will still be there but it will be reframed in a much more healthy way. Also, hopefully a step back towards homosexuality being accepted again. Although I'm straight, I feel very sad at the way this has moved backwards in recent times.

I always thought the bit about opposite sex pupils was there for very exceptional events, such as where a boarding school teacher had to live in, and couldn't (in time) get a school for their child. But that it was never intended as a permanent kind of fixture or solution. That kind of scenario.

The "oh that's arguable" point feels like Stonewall all over again. Only with an extra helping of unpleasantness because it's adults taking direct aim at children's rights to single sex education.

digitaleditions.telegraph.co.uk/data/1311/reader/reader.html?social#!preferred/0/package/1311/pub/1311/page/2/article/NaN

What a sensationalist and ideologically odd thread title.

Take it up with the Telegraph, @KaihahUmoniiv, OP wasn’t editorialising!

Do Matrix Chambers get to keep money if they lose this case from parents who want to end their family tree suw to the drugs they give their children and empty their bank accounts in the process?

These are probably the girls that would benefit most from being in a girls school. She gets to explore the identity without being placed in danger in a mixed sex school using the boys facilities. And be exposed to all the different personalities etc that girls have so she doesn't feel the only way to be able to enjoy or do anything is to become a boy.

I'm glad to see that common sense wins here.

https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/transgender-pupils-can-be-rejected-by-single-sex-schools-khps2j9sv

A similar article in the Times mentions though that the guidance on pronoun use is left entirely up to the individual school, and Gillian Keegan has suggested htat parents need not be told if the school transitions their child if the school has ' safeguarding concerns' about the family.

Guidelines not law though right? Many Heads will ignore this as they have other guidance from the govt on these matters.

Except if you are a teacher in a school in which pronoun use is practiced and you don't feel comfortable with it........

"The document is also expected to say that teachers will not be forced to call children by their preferred pronouns, although many schools are thought to adopt this practice"

Yes, very wishy washy guidelines which give no clarity at all, and no consistency.

Is this wishy-washy'ness down to Gillian Keegan alone, I wonder?

Here's a share for the Times

Transgender pupils ‘can be rejected’ by single-sex schools

www.thetimes.co.uk/article/06c204f6-dd74-11ed-a0a8-657f9e54fc6a?shareToken=7051ab301d04e48857e99b1ffd1b4be3

I think we need to see what it says. A lot of what's being said about it from sources could always be those sources trying to influence the document.

On Jeremy Vine now....

...to be handled with his usual diplomacy and rounded thinking I'm sure....
At the very least, hopefully someone will phone in and say something "controversial"* and a some complaints will be raised. Enough to get it in the main news 🤞🤞

*by controversial I mean sensible and in line with what's being proposed.

Ah they ran out of time!

Although I agree, that if it was tested in court, they would run into trouble, there is no doubt that single sex organisations are doing this.

The girl guides, for instance, said that despite being a girls only association they will admit boys who identify as girls.

And, initially, they said they would reject girls who identify as boys. They changed their mind on that, presumably due to a quick consultation with their lawyers.

They have a 'trans inclusive' policy, which includes adults who work for them or are volunteers.

As far as I know, the policy says that leadership roles must be female, but they include males who identify as female in this. Like Monica Sully.

So it's definitely happening, although a school probably can't be sued for not letting it happen.

The headline implies that transgender children are excluded from education. Not the case.

And is it just me who who thinks the photo accompanying that headline is seriously seriously off. Might even sum up why so many girls are uncomfortable with being girls.