Equality Education and Protected Characteristics | Cottesmore St Mary Catholic Primary School

Equalities at Cottesmore St Mary

At Cottesmore St Mary, we seek to foster a warm, welcoming and respectful environment which allows us to question and challenge discrimination and inequalities, resolve conflicts peacefully and work and learn free from harassment. We recognise that there are similarities and differences between individuals and groups and strive to ensure that our differences do not become barriers to participation, access and learning and create inclusive processes and practices, where the varying needs of individuals and groups are identified and met. We strive to treat each member of our community as an individual; to make each individual feel valued and to teach our pupils to do the same. Trying to achieve this involves us all learning what we all have in common as well as valuing our many differences. We believe that children will learn better in a school where everyone feels equally safe and welcome.
As well as teaching the children about equality, diversity and the protected characteristics through the curriculum, we also regularly discuss these ideas with the children in assemblies and celebration days and aim to reflect these values in our day to day interactions with the children.

It is against the law to discriminate against anyone because of:

age
gender reassignment
being married or in a civil partnership
being pregnant or on maternity leave
disability
race including colour, nationality, ethnic or national origin
religion or belief
sex
sexual orientation

These are called protected characteristics:

Other groups of pupils who are important to consider:

Looked-after pupils / children who were previously look-after
Young carers
Pupils eligible for free school meals or living in poverty

Please take a look at our Equality Policy, Equality Objectives, Accessibility Plan, Protective Characteristics Coverage and our Protective Characteristics Book List for more information:

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Protected Characteristics Book List

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At Cottesmore St Mary, in addition to teaching all the protected characteristics in every year group, we ensure that our children are given opportunities to develop age-appropriate knowledge and understanding through our well-planned and delivered EPR curriculum. They also form part of our RE, History, Geography and English lessons; starting in EYFS, where positive messages on equality and diversity are shared with the children, including in books that form part of English lessons and early reading in KS1.
Staff have also received training on the protected characteristics. Posters of protected characteristics are in all teaching classrooms for teachers to make reference to at every possible opportunity

The nine protected characteristics are actively promoted in school through:

Our school core values
Our school behaviour policy
Conscious role modelling by all adults in the school community
Active engagement and communication with parents and carers
Assemblies
Discussion within curriculum subjects, taking a cross-curricular approach
Promoting articulation by building appropriate language and a coherent vocabulary
RSHE sessions
Half-termly book studies relating to the protected characteristics
Religious Education (RE) lessons
Sporting, Art and Cultural Events
Pupil Voice
Educational visits
Real-life learning outside the classroom
Guest speakers
Developing links with local, national and international communities
Extra-curricular activities, after-school clubs, charity work and work within the local community

We collect and analyse the following data to assess the impact of our Equality Policy. The data is recorded on our CPOMs system and the main areas we assess are:

Behaviour
Bullying
Child in Need
Child Protection
Home issue
Medical Issue
Parental Concern
Reflection
Racial incidents
Bullying incidents
Homophobic incidents
Sexual Harassment
Gender inequality
SEND

As well as the specific equality objectives that we are working on and are set out in our Equality Objectives and Accessibility Action Plan, Cottesmore St Mary takes a whole school approach to equality and community cohesion. We seek to embed equality of access, opportunity and outcome for all members of our school community, within all aspects of school life. We actively seek out opportunities in and outside of the curriculum to embrace all aspects of equalities some examples of which are listed below:

Disability Awareness

Disability Awareness helps to break down barriers to acceptance and inclusion of people with all types of disabilities. Through awareness, students develop empathy, which first affects their attitudes and then evolves into behavioural changes. Through this work, students are inspired to become agents of change for inclusion.
Through EPR lessons, the children across the school are taught specific lessons which support teaching and learning about the social model of disability. This resource has been specifically designed to give a voice to and to share the experiences of some disabled children and young people living and attending school and college in Brighton & Hove. These lessons help to challenge stereotypes, raise aspirations and contribute to a shared understanding of the social model of disability. We also challenge stereotypes through the books we read to the children and the choices of images we present.

Gender Equality

We are committed to ensuring equal treatment of all our school community, regardless of gender. We will ensure that neither men nor women are treated less favourably in any procedures, practices or aspects of school life. We believe that this will help reinforce our commitment to improving performance of all pupils, and being a school where all are included.
Through EPR lessons, the children across the school are taught specific lessons which support teaching and learning about gender equality and stereotyping. These lessons help to challenge stereotypes, raise aspirations and contribute to a shared understanding of equality. We also challenge stereotypes through the books we read to the children and the choices of images we present.
In history, children in year 6 learn about the determination of the Suffragettes and gender inequality. The children learn about the many inequalities still faced by genders across the globe and are inspired to become agents of change for inclusion.
We analyse all our data by gender to check if there is an issue we need to address.
At school, we celebrate the contributions that women have made to the world through assemblies and celebration days, for example, International Women’s Day, International Day of Women in Science. Other notable females the children study throughout the year in class and through assemblies are: Malala Yousafzai, Kamala Harris, Rosa Parks, Emmeline Pankhurst, Frida Kahlo, Maya Angelou, Greta Thunberg, to name a few.

Family Equality

At Cottesmore St Mary, we value all family types as equally special and recognise that children need to be proactively taught that other children’s families can be different to their own family type. We celebrate families in special ‘Good To Be Me’ lessons and throughout our RSHE/EPR curriculum. Our hope and experience is that celebrating family diversity encourages children to share and therefore educate other children about the variety of family types in our community.
We use the term ‘grown ups’ as a general term rather than ‘mums and dads’ to refer to children’s significant adults so that children who live with one parent; 2 mums; 2 dads; foster parents or who live with extended family do not feel that their own family make-up is not included. We ask club providers to use this language too. Not only do we avoid certain language, we also actively talk about different family types and children regularly hear all family types recognised in our language. We buy books that include a variety of family types so everybody feels seen.
We realise that there are financial inequalities between families at Cottesmore St Mary and, via our Poverty proofing audit, aim to ensure no family or child is excluded from a school event or activity for financial reasons and that we do not add stress or embarrassment to families
In Relationships and Sex Education, we teach the children that babies are conceived in different ways (conception teaching formally happens in Year 5 but questions can begin before then and will be answered in an age-appropriate way) – a parent/carer meeting always takes place before RSE lessons take place.
We recognise that children who are adopted into families or fostered often have specific needs and may need additional care. We are sensitive to areas of the curriculum / the calendar year that may affect children. We know that change and transition are sensitive times for children with attachment difficulties and will work with parents/carers to support this.

Race and Heritage Equality

We value all our children as individuals and value the diversity of racial and cultural heritage within our community. Through our curriculum, we find as many opportunities as possible to teach the children about other cultures and ethnicities.
Through EPR lessons, we teach children about Gypsy, Roma and Traveller cultures in the curriculum and assemblies.
We make sure toys, displays, books and resources reflect a range of people from different cultures and avoid stereotypes. We are proactive in making sure everybody is represented and complete diversity learning walks.
Every year we celebrate Refugee Week. We hold assemblies and teach the children about refugees as part of the curriculum. To mark Refugee week, we put together our own recommended reading list of authors closely linked with refugees. At Cottesmore, we promote the importance of sanctuary and the benefits it can bring to both refugees and host communities.
We celebrate Black History Month in assemblies and are developing a more diverse / hidden history curriculum. Please see our ‘Anti-racism and Racial Literacy’ page for more information.
We hold annual Language Week in September in which we celebrate all the children’s languages and invite members of our community to come and talk about their cultures. We try and use children’s languages regularly (e.g. in answering the register). We have many after school languages club to encourage speaking another language.