Ireland needs “to discuss possible changes to education” towards better accommodating transgender pupils, a Government minister has stated.
The message came from Community and Social Support Minister Kevin Humphreys at the conclusion of the first round of talks between the Department of Education and various groups, including school representatives and those of the LGBT community, in light of recently enacted legislation on gender recognition, according to The Irish Independent.
The report says that schools – concerned both with this law and current equality legislation – are now faced with questions around issues such as uniforms and toilets as they are forced to consider the place of transgender students among the school population.
Following the meeting, Minister Kevin Humphreys, who was directly involved in the passage of the gender recognition law through the Oireachtas, said it was now important to identify “what issues are there and make sure that they are addressed”, adding that there is “a need to discuss possible changes to policy and to education”.
The Irish Independent pointed out that the exemption for single-sex schools looks certain to be of particular attention in the wake of the talks, with questions arising as to the implications for such a school should a pupil claim the right to change gender during their schooling.
One participant at the talks conceded that “the finer details” have not yet been discussed.
In the US, they have been considered for some time now and many American schools have been embroiled in disputes about whether boys identifying as girls should be allowed to use female changing rooms and female toilets, for example. This had led to complaints from parents and from the girls.
Some schools have tried to get around this by offering transgender pupils their own facilities. However, transgendered groups have rejected this compromise claiming that only by having access to the facilities of the gender they identify with will transgender pupils feel fully accepted.
As a results, schools have now begun to ‘neutralise’ facilities to eradicate the ‘male’ and ‘female’ categories, with the latest school, a kindergarten in California, moving to this arrangement for pre-schoolers identifying as transgender; one participant at the Irish meeting insisted that children as young as six are now identifying as transgender.
