A Self-Reflective Essay to the Safe Schools Program

A self-reflective awareness response to the Safe Schools Program, its transition from state to national deployment and the role we as educators play in this effort.

Given a highlighted awareness of homosexuality/gender in mainstream media and the progression from LGBT to LGBTQI+ as a recognised term, Australia has made some progress in its treatment and understanding of same sex attracted (SSA) and/or gender diverse (GD) individuals (collectively SSAGD). In schools though, the work has only just begun. With roughly 15% of students as SSAGD (Radcliffe, Ward & Scott, 2016), 75% of these students have experienced abuse or discrimination. Perhaps more alarming though is that this abuse or discrimination occurred 80% of the time at school and of these students 81% didn’t feel support from their schools (Hillier et al, 2010). In response to this the Safe Schools Coalition Victoria (SSCV) was established in 2010 and it's Safe Schools Program (SSP) will be delivered to all government secondary schools in Victoria by 2019. Upon this program’s transition to a national rollout though, via the Safe Schools Coalition Australia (SSCA), the SSP was amended due to political pressure. This paper aims to highlight why safe schools are important, provide an understanding of the transition from a State program to National and the role that we play as educators in this space.

The Safe Schools Program

While the VIT Code of Conduct (VIT, 2015) itself is a reason why the SSP is important, it is perhaps best summarised under Principle 1.2 in that teachers should “...protect learners from intimidation, embarrassment, humiliation or harm”. Underpinning educators is the learning of those being taught and successful learning cannot occur without a safe learning environment. An unsafe learning environment could have wide ranging impacts, from a learner being generally distracted in class, feeling isolated, having an early departure from school to the more alarming and devastating attraction to self harm. The study “From Blues to Rainbows” (Smith et al, 2014) revealed that GD students “who did not feel supported by their teachers were over four times more likely to leave school” and “over 90% of young people who experienced physical abuse had thought about suicide”. Sadly, the truth of the matter is that our current situation is failing us. The tragic passing of a young Queensland boy last month (Atkin, 2016) who suffered through years of homophobic taunts and physical abuse only serves to cement how important teacher support and the SSP are in being deployed in schools.

As opposed to having a specific program for SSAGD awareness, it has been suggested that more robust anti-bullying and harassment measures be put in place. While this may seem like a step in the right direction, these individuals may not understand the intention of the SSP. Take, for example, the commonly used and seemingly innocuous phrase “that’s so gay” which historically has been used as a homophobic slur. An anti-bullying measure might be to refrain from using that phrase as it is homophobic but the question should be asked is “why is that phrase being used?” When a male student today uses this phrase to another male student, they most likely do not intend to say that the other is a homosexual. Instead they are using it to undermine the other’s masculinity or by highlighting the individuals femininity. While the phrase might have had homophobic origins, it could also be interpreted as a sexist or transphobic remark - what exactly is wrong with a student portraying historically feminine traits? This is why the SSP is important. Instead of perpetuating that sex and gender are binary and exclusive (you are either male or female and showing characteristics of the other is a weakness), the SSP includes education that gender is a social construct, that it can be fluid and is inclusive (everyone falls somewhere on the spectrum).

Transition from State to National program

The SSCV and SSCA both share the Safe Schools moniker but their respective programs unfortunately do not share as many similarities. Despite an expert led, evidence research based curriculum program developed in Victoria, the Federal government commissioned an independent review of the program due to complaints from party members. The independent review found that it was “consistent with the aims of the program, is suitable, robust, age-appropriate, educationally sound and aligned with the Australian Curriculum” (Louden, 2016). Despite this, the Federal government has made a series of changes to the program to be adopted by the SSCA. Whilst each change could easily be analysed, explored and refuted, on a surface level the questions worth asking are:

● Why did the Federal government commission an independent third party review only to ignore its findings? (inherently redundant)

● Why is the the national program opt-in for schools, despite the program being verified as within the Australian Curriculum (and now placed largely repurposed to identify more as anti-bullying)? (Does the government think anti-bullying is opt in?)

● Does requiring parental consent undermine the efficacy of the program?

● Why are politicians essentially dictating what and how things are taught?

Premier Daniel Andrews of Victoria responses to these changes was “I get my advice on policy from experts, not from bigots, not from people who really ought to be ashamed of themselves in terms of their views and tampering with a program that actually works” (Akerman, 2016).

Our role as educators

Despite all secondary government schools in Victoria becoming Safe Schools by 2019, to what extent this will be incorporated into their curriculum will ultimately be decided by individual schools. While it may seem challenging as new educators to champion this change, as “many new teachers remain resistant to addressing LGB issues; some hesitate out of fear or intimidation” (Heifetz & Linksy, 2002), we must remind ourselves of the purpose of this change.