Background
Saint Gabriel’s College is a small, inclusive Church of England secondary school in Lambeth (south London) where every member of the community is valued. All our students are encouraged to achieve excellence by working hard, continuously improving, growing spiritually and thinking of others.
The proportion of disadvantaged students known to be eligible for the pupil premium is above average, over half the school’s population. The majority of students are from minority ethnic backgrounds. Almost half the students speak English as an additional language which is much higher than the national average.
We know that with appropriate encouragement, challenge and support, our students will shine with confidence in their learning, grow in their spiritual and moral awareness and develop the skills and attitudes necessary to make the world a better place.
We aim to work as a family. This ensures excellent relationships across the school: students support and encourage each other, and each child is known and nurtured. We know that strong partnerships with parents and carers make a huge difference to success at school, so we work hard to build strong home/school relationships too.
WHY DID THE SCHOOL CHOOSE TO WORK WITH SHAUN DELLENTY?
Shaun was recommended to us by our School Chaplain, Mother Ellen Eames, who had seen him in action and who had also heard lots of positive feedback from our colleagues in our Diocese. While our school works hard to positively prevent LGBT+ and identify based prejudice resulting in very low incidences of this type of behaviour, we felt that this wasn’t enough and that we really needed to draw attention to the great contributions that the LGBT+ community has made to our society and ensure that our staff and students are well-equipped to be LGBT+ champions outside of our school too. We concluded that working with Shaun would enable us to achieve this goal.
HOW HAS THE WORK OF SHAUN DELLENTY IMPACTED UPON THE SCHOOL?
Initially, all of our teachers took part in a training session run by Shaun. They had already received training on LGBT+ terminology and some of the issues that the community faces so Shaun tailored his session to take this into account and, as a result, our staff got a lot out of it. His personal anecdotes really brought the issue to life and the clear link between LGBT+ prejudice and negative mental health has strengthened our already strong commitment to giving our students a truly inclusive experience. His support has also enabled us to plan and deliver an excellent LGBT+ Inclusion Week, where our staff supported our students to lead the way in addressing LGBT+ prejudice. We know that some of our students identify as LGBT+ and we want to be sure that they feel safe in being themselves and that they will not experience any prejudice because of who they truly are. It was also great to see so many of our students sign up for our Gender Equality Action Group. We actually had more students sign up for this than we could manage, which is actually pretty great!
HOW DID THE TRAINING IMPACT UPON YOUR SCHOOL?
Our teachers now feel confident to tackle LGBT+ prejudice head on without “upsetting parents”. Every member of staff knows their responsibility in sustaining a truly inclusive school community and our known LGBT+ students are visibly more confident in being themselves. We continue to take immediate action against any prejudice that is reported or encountered.
HOW DID THE TRAINING IMPACT UPON TEACHING AND LEARNING?
Teachers feel confident in highlighting the LGBT+ community in their schemes of work. For example, Alan Turing makes an appearance in Computing and we discuss attitudes to LGBT+ more confidently in Humanities.
HOW DID THE TRAINING IMPACT UPON BEHAVIOUR?
The number of negative behaviour reports regarding LGBT+ prejudice have reduced. While they were already very low, they have almost been eradicated. The few that remain tend to be use of the phrase “you’re so gay” in a negative way by our younger students or students who are new to the school. We continue to work to ensure that this type of behaviour is eradicated and we do this through our behaviour systems and through our curriculum.
HOW DID THE TRAINING IMPACT UPON ATTITUDES?
Students are more confident in discussing LGBT+ issues, as are our staff members. It’s difficult to assess attitudes but we are confident that our students’ attitudes have improved.
WHAT HAVE BEEN YOUR BIGGEST ACHIEVEMENTS SINCE THE TRAINING?
Our successful LGBT+ Inclusion Week has been our biggest achievement since the training. While we were planning this, some of our LGBT+ students volunteered to deliver assemblies alongside their peers. We are proud that our students felt confident and safe in the knowledge that our entire school community is supportive of them and that they can be free to be who they are without fear of prejudice or discrimination.
HOW MIGHT LIFE IN SCHOOL HAVE CHANGED FOR ANY LGBT+ PUPILS IN YOUR SCHOOL SINCE THE TRAINING?
As above, we feel that our LGBT+ students are more comfortable in being themselves. We are also more confident that our students can challenge each other in a calm, safe manner on LGBT+ views. We continue to place LGBT+ inclusive posters around our school and we continue to discuss LGBT+ issues across the curriculum to show all of our students that school is a safe space.
HOW MIGHT LIFE IN SCHOOL HAVE CHANGED FOR ANY LGBT+ TEACHERS IN YOUR SCHOOL SINCE THE TRAINING?
When we discuss LGBT+ inclusivity as a school, we make a point to ensure that staff know that this also includes them too. While are sustaining a safe space for our LGBT+ students, our staff know that the school is a safe space for them too. Our Principal is very clear that if our teachers experience any LGBT+ prejudice from anybody who visits our school, including parents, then they will be supported and those being prejudiced will be challenged. We are not afraid to call out prejudice of any kind.
