Equality And Diversity

St Anne’s Academy respects and celebrates the diversity within our community and is committed to providing an environment which ensures that all pupils and staff are treated with dignity and respect. We seek to provide a positive learning and working environment, free from discrimination, harassment, or victimisation.

We are committed to fulfilling our statutory duties under the Equality Act 2010 tackling all forms of discrimination by:

• eliminating discrimination and other conduct that is prohibited by the Act,
• advancing equality of opportunity between people who share a protected characteristic and people who do not share it,
• fostering good relations across all characteristics – between people who share a protected characteristic and people who do not share it.

The Cranmer Education Trust is an Equal Opportunities Employer and welcomes applicants from all groups.

Collecting and publishing governing board diversity data

Diversity is important and we want our trustees and our local governing committees to be increasingly reflective of the communities they serve. The Trust is in the process of working through GovernorHub’s facility to see if it is possible to collate Trustees’ and Local Governing Board members’ information. The return will be voluntarily, and they can opt out of sharing their information, including protected characteristics, at any given time including after publication. To ensure that individuals cannot be identified through the publication of data, anonymous data will only be published in an appropriate format based on the number of optional returns. The current legal advice is that the safest way to protect data subjects and special category data, meeting the UK GDPR standard, would be to publish information that does not amount to ‘personal’ because it is anonymous, and therefore data protection principles do not apply.

Our Trust and Schools’ Equality Objectives for 2022-2026 are as follows:

Equality Objective 1 – Elimination of Sexual Violence and Sexual Harassment

To continue the high profile of committing to the elimination of sexual violence and harassment (SV&H) and to be able to review the statistics with updated policies and procedures, training received, and developed curriculums with staff committed to educating our children and young people to recognise SV&H and to be increasingly able to report it, by being able to articulate it and by being confident in doing so.

Actions:

1.   Training – continue to disseminate trust training video created for all staff and governors/trustees, particularly those with responsibility for safeguarding. Extend individual training for teachers, as required.

2.   Policy – behaviour, E-Safety and Relationships and Sex Education/Wellbeing have been reviewed in all schools.  Policy updates have gone through local committees. In 2022/23 policies will become procedural and impact on reports and data.

3.   Systems in place to report, record and monitor incidents of sexual violence and harassment. Local safeguarding named persons challenge of data on safeguarding reports. Standards Committee oversight.

4.   Pupil Voice – to what extent are pupils aware of what is acceptable and what is not in relation to SV&H and able to articulate and report comfortably and confidently.

Equality Objective 2 – Equality, Diversity, and Inclusion as a Safeguarding Issue

By addressing sexual violence and harassment when it occurs, and by having the processes and procedures and the curriculum as the foundation to develop understanding we are also helping children and young people’s mental health. SV&H is a safeguarding issue. The statutory guidance in KCSIE states that safeguarding is:

• Protecting children from maltreatment
• Preventing impairment of children’s mental and physical health or development
• Ensuring that children grow up in circumstances consistent with the provision of safe and effective care
• Taking action to enable all children to have the best outcomes

It is therefore our objective to recognise all equality, diversity, and inclusion issues as safeguarding issues and potentially, human rights. Knowing which vulnerable and protected characteristic groups are potentially more at risk and include issues e.g., modern slavery, or implications of domestic abuse.

Actions:

1.   Safeguarding Governance – continue to review SV&H through governance processes and to consider more widely all protected characteristics, inclusion, and diversity when we challenge and consider safeguarding issues.

Equality Objective 3 – Shaping Inclusive Culture for Growth

We commit to continuing to educate ourselves, as leaders, teachers and educators and using our personal agency and ability to act as agents of change. Together we determine what equality and social justice looks like and shape the culture through our ethos as a trust, and in all our schools.

Actions:

1. People Plan – staff surveys, creating culture, welcoming difference
2. Brand relaunch – representation of diversity – more voices, more stories, more diversity modelled.
3. Cranmer Institute – as the agent for training staff and educating ourselves (curriculum design, staff awareness, leadership of inclusivity)
4. Faith inclusivity – equality, diversity, and inclusion in relation all faiths and none across a growing trust.