LGBTQ education: battle for curriculum
After the new government of the UK has been set and Gavin Williamson got his portfolio of the Education Secretary he continued the struggle of his predecessor, Damian Hinds. The upgrade of educational programme proposed by Andrew Moffat from Parkfield school was pretty much in course with the attempts of the British government to ensure equality and diversity. No outsiders programme is intended to familiarize students with LGBTQ community starting from the primary school. The natural move has however been strongly opposed by parents. They went as far as to organize demonstrations in front of school gates, interrupting educational process, and finally withdrawing their children from the school.
Luckily, Gavin Williamson has backed LGBTQ education as soon as he took office. “Firstly, we shouldn’t be seeing protests outside any schools.
“We want to make sure all pupils, parents and teachers are able to go to those schools freely without any form of intimidation,” said Williamson. “We will be there supporting and backing every single school — that’s what we have been doing. The purpose of it is we wanted to make sure every single school is able to teach about Britain as it is today — but also have the flexibility to ensure that it has an understanding of the communities which it operates in,” he added. It is worth noting that Parkfield school has already suspended No outsiders program earlier this year after massive protests. The new curriculum effective this September will include a modified version of the program regardless some parents want their children know nothing about LGBTQ community. To complete the action, the program will be become mandatory starting September, 2020.
The arguments of the protesters are plain and unsatisfactory. Some parents complain the topics discussed to be inappropriate, adult, and too complex for children to understand. Really? The students can deal with hi-tech, religion and other complex matters but are unable to understand how different people could be? It sounds at least strange. Not surprisingly, most of the protests regarding LGBTQ education in the UK come from the religious communities, namely Muslims and evangelical Christians. This fact is worth attention as it repeats in other countries including the US. The conservative elements should finally realize that they are not the only ones in the entire Universe and let their children make personal choice.
