Thu 28 Aug 2014 In: New Zealand Daily News View at Wayback View at NDHA
Green MP Kevin Hague says a report showing just a third of schools have policies around homophobic bullying, and barely any acknowledge gender diversity at all, “demands action”. ‘How Safe Are Our Schools?: An analysis of the Current Policy Framework Aimed at Protecting Queer Young People in New Zealand’ has been put together for the Greens by Waikato University Master's student Murray Riches. The full report is attached below. The just-released study is based on Official Information Act requests to 60 New Zealand high schools. In all, 37 responded and 36 are included in the study results. Just 18.8 per cent of the schools which took part demonstrated “a proactive role in challenging heteronormativity” to provide a safe and supportive environment for their students. Even fewer, 8.3 per cent, provided documents that included some mention of gender diversity. The vast majority of did not have any mention of issues specific to gender diverse students, and some specifically excluded trans identities. Only 31.3 per cent of the total schools showed evidence that their anti-bullying education made special mention of some kind of diversity education, while just 14.6 per cent showed they had education relating to sexual and gender diversity in their anti-bullying education programmes. When it came to principals themselves, 22.9 per cent were aware of at least once instance of homophobic bullying. “Given the exceptionally high rate of bullying experienced by queer youth at high school, it is very surprising, and concerning, to discover that over half of the principals who responded to this question were not aware of even one instance of homophobic bullying in their school,” Riches says in the report. “This lack of awareness amongst schools highlights how the marginalisation of queer young people may often go unnoticed, or even accepted as normal, by school staff, and rings alarm bells about the systems in place for preventing, identifying, reporting and addressing queer bullying.” Riches says while some schools are doing significant work to ensure the safety of their students, it is apparent from the findings that there is far too much variation amongst the level of support and protection offered to queer students, with some schools failing to meet even the most minimal requirements, or even accepting that queer students exist within them. “This finding should be of great concern to ERO and the Ministry of Education as it means a significant proportion of students in New Zealand secondary schools are not kept safe by the current policy framework schools are expected to adhere to.” Riches says what is even more alarming is that the current system of checks and balances that is supposed to ensure the safety of these students, through the ERO review process, did not detect significant issues with this sample of schools. “Just 18.3 per cent of the schools had mention of any issues which relate to bullying or exclusion of queer students in the ERO reports, and upon further checking, the results for these particular schools were often incongruous with the results of our survey. In fact, some of the schools that ERO noted positively on measures of 'diversity' and 'inclusion' were extremely poor performing when it came to policies and awareness of issues relating to queer students.” The researcher says while the current legislative framework does implicitly include a requirement that schools have policies in place to combat sexuality and gender-based bullying, “the results of this study suggest this most minimal requirement is not being appropriately monitored or enforced by ERO. This disparity suggests there is a need for greater compulsion and in-depth monitoring of student safety.” The study follows a Green Party-sponsored report from Riches in 2011 on how we can ‘make things better now’ for lgbti youth, a project driven by gay Green MP Kevin Hague. Kevin Hague Hague says the new report shows that, fundamentally, we need a specific national standard for schools to achieve in supporting young queer people and keeping them safe. “Schools need resources and assistance to help them achieve the standard, but then their performance must be regularly and independently assessed, and remedial actions required if the standard is not met. This is a basic quality improvement cycle,” he says the report foreword. Hague also notes “with alarm” the great difficulty the researchers had obtaining from many schools material which must have been readily to hand as it had just been supplied to ERO. “Many public schools were very reluctant to provide information, and some still have not despite their legal obligations. Most private schools refused to supply information,” Hague says. “The safety and wellbeing of young people is a matter of extreme public interest, and it is not acceptable for schools to refuse to meet their duty of public accountability, whether or not this is currently required by law.” He finishes: “This is a very important report. It demands action.” It follows a Green-sponsored report from Riches in 2011 on how we can ‘make things better now’ for lgbti youth. Recommendations: Make teaching about sexual and gender diversity an explicit, rather than implicit, curriculum requirement for all schools. Greater transparency into the environment for queer students in private, charter and state-integrated special character schools, including clear lines of responsibility for ensuring their safety. A Ministry-led inquiry into the safety of queer students being educated in 'specialcharacter' school environments where that special character is based on religious or cultural texts or values that explicitly discourage or condemn queer behaviour and identities. Government funding for community-based educators to carry out rainbow diversity workshops in secondary schools. The Ministry to work with existing resources, organisations and guidelines for creating safe environments, to make them more accessible to schools and help schools implement them, as well as understanding their legal obligations. Standard ERO assessments to include specific reporting on how well the school is ensuring a safe environment for queer students and staff. ERO assessors to be trained in what a queer-friendly environment looks like, and ERO, the Ministry of Education and other government departments to change reporting practices to include more diverse gender identities than 'girls and boys'. Kevin Hague will discuss the report at Rainbow Wellington drinks at Rush Bar on Friday 5 September from 5PM. All welcome.
Credit: GayNZ.com Daily News staff
First published: Thursday, 28th August 2014 - 4:30pm