School’s Out

Stonewall’s latest research into the experiences of lesbian, gay, bi and trans students has been published. While there is much to celebrate, there is still much left to do. What are the experiences of your  lesbian, gay, bi and trans students?

The findings of Stonewall’s 2017 research into the experiences of lesbian, gay, bi and trans students compare favourably with Stonewall’s 2007 report. Ten years on, it seems that bullying, for example, has fallen by almost a third. However, while there is much to celebrate, there is still much left to do. The 2017 research found that significant numbers of lesbian, gay, bi and trans students still experience bullying. Half of LGB&T students hear homophobic slurs ‘frequently’ or ‘often’ at their place of education.

Senior staff and managers are not always aware of such incidents as these are frequently not reported. Ofsted have found, for example that sometimes managers are confident that LGB&T bullying is not an issue, yet find the opposite to be true when they speak to learners.

What are the experiences of your LGB&T learners? Do they have a specific voice in your learner activities? Have you trained staff on how to tackle the use of homophobic slurs? What is the impact of this training?

You can download the report here

The report is accompanied by a campaign video which you can see here