For a school or educational setting to receive an OFFRED rating of ‘Good’ it must demonstrate that its policies are likely to protect its students from psychological or physical harm.
Mere compliance with Government Guidance would be sufficient for an ‘Adequate’ rating. To be rated ‘Good’ a school must be an exemplar of best practice in both teaching and pastoral policy. A commitment to honesty, to facts and reality, must run through the ethos of the school.
At its simplest this means that both Critical Race Theory and Gender Identity Theory are only taught at post GCSE and above and as comparators to other opposing political theories as well as the status quo.
Neither gender theory nor critical race theory is to be embedded in school policies, or in learning materials for those under 17 years old.
Explaining the existence of people who do not conform to sex-based stereotypes must be factual and honest, and must avoid using the language of political activists.
For example: “Sophie’s Dad dresses in women’s clothing.” is preferable to “Sophie has two Mums and one of them is trans.”
For general policies, it is possible to ensure that the existence of the protected characteristic of ‘gender reassignment’ in the Equality Act 2010 is not used as a lever to introduce self-identification of incongruent sex identities ‘through the back door’. For example, a policy that will address all students by their given name and with pronouns according to their sex does not discriminate. In such an environment a student who considers that they have that protected characteristic cannot complain of discrimination if the same rules apply to everyone else. Note that the ‘gender reassignment’ has no equivalence with sex. the only place in United Kingdom law where sex and gender are conflated (creating bad law) is in Section 9 of the Gender Recognition Act 2004. Given the provisions of this Section only apply to those in receipt of a Gender Recognition Certificate, and those are only available to those over 18, it is highly unlikely that its provisions are relevant in aschool setting.
Even so, The Equality Act says discrimination can be justified if the person who’s discriminating against you can show it’s a proportionate means of achieving a legitimate aim. If necessary, it’s the courts which will decide if discrimination can be justified. Upholding facts and reality in education is, surely, a legitimate aim.
The school or institution must be in compliance with law on separate toilet facilities for each sex.
For a school to receive a ‘Good’ rating no student will have had an incongruent or synthetic sex identity affirmed in the preceding academic year.
Do you know of a good school? If so, tell us about it! We need to publicise and celebrate good practice so that others might see what it looks like.