Woodcote Primary SchoolEquality, Diversity & Inclusion
Pupils talk with respect when discussing differences and diversity. One pupil told an inspector ‘It doesn’t matter who you are, you should all be treated equally.’ Pupils learn about different religions and families - Ofsted November 2022
General Principles
Under the Equality Act 2010, schools need an Accessibility Plan. The Equality Act 2010 replaced all existing legislation, including the Disability Discrimination Act. The effect of the law is the same as in the past, meaning that “schools cannot unlawfully discriminate against pupils because of sex, race disability, religion or belief and sexual orientation”. According to the Equality Act 2010 a person has a disability if:
*He or she has a physical or mental impairment, and
*The impairment has a substantial and long-term adverse effect on his or her ability to carry our normal day-to-day activities.
At Woodcote Primary School we are committed to giving all of our children every opportunity to achieve the highest standards. We do this by taking account of pupils’ varied life experiences and needs. We offer a broad and balanced curriculum and have high expectations for all children. The achievements, attitudes and well-being of all our children matter. Woodcote Primary School promotes the individuality of all our children, irrespective of ethnicity, faith, attainment, age, disability, gender or background.
Our school strives to be an inclusive school. We actively seek to remove the barriers to learning and participation that can hinder or exclude individual pupils, or groups of pupils.
How do we know that we are meeting our Equality Duties?
Report December 2021
1.What are our Equality Duties?
It is our duty to acknowledge and comply with the Equality Act 2010 and Public Sector Equality Duty 2011 (PSED). The equality duty has two parts, a general duty and specific duties. The general duty has three aims for schools. In all that we do we must…
- Eliminate unlawful discrimination, harassment and victimisation and other conduct prohibited by the Equality Act 2010.
- Advance equality of opportunity between people who share a protected characteristic and those who do not.
- Foster good relations between people who share a protected characteristic and those who do not.
The protected characteristics are:
- race
- disability
- religion and belief
- sex
- gender re-assignment
- age
- pregnancy and maternity
- marital status
- sexual orientation.
All of our children have a right to access our high quality academic and extended curriculum, and experience all of the opportunities that we can offer, regardless of their personal, social or physical differences, and we strive to achieve this each and every day in many ways.
The equality duty supports high quality education and improves our children’s outcomes. It helps us identify priorities such as underperformance, poor progression, and bullying. It does this by requiring us to collate evidence, take a look at the issues and consider taking action to improve the experience of different groups of pupils. It then helps it to focus on what can be done to tackle these issues and to improve outcomes by developing measurable equality objectives.
In order to meet our general equality duty we must do two specific duties.
- Publish information about how we comply with the equality duty.
- Publish one measureable equality objective.
Our Equality Objectives (2021-2024) is:
Reduce incidents of racial discrimination in our school community
Any amount of racial discrimination is too much and through an audit, and carefully considered three year action plan, we will address these issues with our pupils, staff and wider community.
We will be successful in achieving this objective if:
There are less incidents within these three years and beyond at Woodcote.
- How do we know that we are meeting our Equality Duties?
To have due regard for and meet our Equality Duties we must:
- assess when making decisions or taking actions, whether it may have implications for people with particular protected characteristics.
- Consider equality implications before and at the time of developing policy and continually review this.
- Consider each of the three aspects of the general duty
- Risk assess any adverse impact that may result from our policy or decisions and ways to reduce this risk
- Integrate the equality duty in carrying out all of the school’s functions
In a nutshell, eliminating discrimination, promoting equal opportunities and promoting good relationships between those who do and do not have protected characteristics and celebrating this diversity within our school community must be at the forefront of every decision and action that we make. It must lie in the foundations of our school vision, our ethos, our curriculum as well as every one of our policies.
While we do this every day at Woodcote, it is made ever more visible and clearer through documents such as:
Our Equality Objective
Our Accessibility Plan
Our school vision which demonstrate some of the ways that we are meeting our specific and general duties to eliminate discrimination, promote equal opportunities and foster good relations.
Action:
To give further due concern for our Equality Duty, we must include a section in every new Risk Assessment and Policy written showing due consideration for any impact or implications the action/policy will have on people with protected characteristics.
Monitoring:
Mrs Jones is responsible for monitoring our compliance of the Equality Duty.
