Equality and Diversity

At Huntingdon Academy, we constantly review and refine our wider curriculum to ensure that it is an accurate representation of the world we live in. We want lessons that celebrate diversity and promote acceptance and respect. We want a curriculum that allows our children to regularly learn about, and be inspired by, individuals of all abilities from all backgrounds, cultures, genders, sexualities, religions and ethnicities. It is really important for us as a school, that the celebration of differences is embedded in our lessons and discussed frequently at every opportunity possible throughout the year. Weaving diversity throughout our curriculum is an on-going project and something we all feel incredibly passionate about.

Being ‘diverse’ may mean different things to different people. At Huntingdon Academy, we think about the 2010 Equality Act’s nine protected characteristics when striving to be as inclusive and representative as possible.  

Under the Equality Act, there are nine Protected Characteristics:

1. Age
2. Disability
3. Gender reassignment
4. Race
5. Religion or belief
6. Marriage or civil partnership
7. Sex
8. Sexual orientation
9. Pregnancy and maternity

The 9 Protected Characteristics are actively promoted in school through:

• Our school ethos statements, SDP, and SEF
• Our school values
• Our school behaviour policy
• Conscious role modelling by all adults in the school community
• Active engagement and communication with parents and carers
• British Values teaching and events
• Discussion within curriculum subjects, taking a cross-curricular approach
• Promoting articulation by building appropriate language and a coherent vocabulary
• Personal, Social, Health and Economic education (PSHE) sessions
• Religious Education (RE) lessons, RSE lessons, LGBT discussions and Protected Characteristic talks / assemblies
• Sporting, Art and Cultural Events
• Educational trips and visitors
• Developing links with local, national and international communities
• Extra-curricular activities, after-school clubs, charity work and work within the local community

Embedding the 9 Protected Characteristics into our school whole ethos promotes:

• Self-esteem, self-knowledge and self-confidence
• Respect for democracy and support for participation in the democratic process
• An understanding of how citizens can influence decision-making through the democratic process
• Acceptance of responsibility for their own behaviour
• Respect for their own and other cultures
• Understanding of how they can contribute positively to school and home life and to the lives of those living in the local community and beyond
• An understanding of Equality, Human Rights and Protected Characteristics
• An appreciation that living under the rule of law protects individual citizens and is essential for their well-being and safety
• An understanding that the freedom to choose and hold other faiths and beliefs is protected in law
• An acceptance that other people having different faiths or beliefs to oneself (or having none) should be accepted and tolerated, and should not be the cause of prejudicial or discriminatory behaviour
• An understanding of the importance of identifying and combating discrimination

The Equality Act 2010 requires us to publish information that demonstrates that we have due regard for the need to:

• Eliminate unlawful  discrimination, harassment, victimisation  and any other conduct prohibited by the Equality Act 2010
• Advance equality of opportunity between people who share a protected characteristic and people who do not share it
• Foster good relations between people who share a protected characteristic and people who do not share it.

Huntingdon Academy is an inclusive school where we focus on the well-being and progress of every child and where all members of our community are of equal worth.

We believe that the Equality Act provides a framework to support our commitment to valuing diversity, tackling discrimination, promoting equality and fostering good relationships between people. It also ensures that we continue to tackle issues of disadvantage and underachievement of different groups.

Our approach to equality is based on the following key principles:

1. All learners are of equal value

2. We recognise and respect difference

3. We foster positive attitudes and relationships and a shared sense of cohesion and belonging.

4. We observe good equalities practice in staff recruitment, retention and development.

5. We aim to reduce and remove inequalities and barriers that already exist.

6. We have the highest expectations of all our children.

Information on pupils by protected characteristics

The Equality Act 2010 protects people from discrimination on the basis of protected characteristics. Every person has several of the protected characteristics, so the Act protects everyone against unfair treatment.

In order to ensure that all pupils are protected from discrimination, the school collects information on protected characteristics.

Information on other groups of pupils

In addition to pupils with protected characteristics, we gather further information on the following groups of pupils:

• Pupils eligible for Free School Meals (FSM)
• Pupils with Special Educational Needs (SEN)
• Disadvantaged group
• Pupils with English as an Additional Language (EAL)
• Young carers
• Looked after children
• Other vulnerable groups

Eliminating discrimination and other conduct that is prohibited by the Act

The information provided here aims to demonstrate that we give careful consideration to equality issues in everything that we do at Huntingdon Academy. ‘Due regard’ ensures that we work towards eliminating discrimination, harassment and victimisation and other conduct that is prohibited by the Equality Act.

We are committed to working for equality for all our staff, parents/carers and children to meet our duties under the Equality Act 2010.

We eliminate discrimination by:

• Adoption of the single Equality Scheme
• Our behaviour policy ensures that all children feel safe at school and addresses prejudicial bullying
• Reporting, responding to and monitoring all racist incidents
• Regularly monitoring the curriculum to ensure that the curriculum meets the needs of our pupils and that it promotes respect for diversity and challenges negative stereotyping
• Teaching is of the highest quality to ensure children reach their potential and all pupils are given equal entitlement to success
• Tracking pupil progress to ensure that all children make rapid progress, and intervening when necessary
• Ensuring that all pupils have the opportunity to access extra-curricular provision
• Listening to and monitoring views and experiences of pupils and adults to evaluate the effectiveness of our policies and procedures.

Advancing equality of opportunity between people who share a protected characteristic and people who do not share it

We advance equality of opportunity by:

• Using the information we gather to identify underachieving groups or individuals and plan targeted intervention
• Ensuring participation of  parents/carers and pupils in school development
• Listening to parents/carers
• Listening to pupils at all times

Fostering good relations across all characteristics – between people who share a protected characteristic and people who do not share it

We foster good relations by:

• Ensuring that Huntingdon Academy is seen as a community school within our local community
• Ensuring that equality and diversity are embedded in the curriculum and in collective worship.

Equality Objectives

At Huntingdon Academy, we are committed to ensuring equality of education and opportunity for all pupils, staff, parents and carers, irrespective of race, gender, disability, belief, religion or socio-economic background.

In order to further support pupils, raise standards and ensure inclusive teaching, we

have set the following objectives:

Objective 1: To monitor and analyse pupil achievement by race, gender and disability

and act on any trends or patterns in the data that require additional support for pupils.

Objective 2: To raise levels of attainment in core subjects for vulnerable learners.

Objective 3: To review levels of parental and pupil engagement in learning and school life, across all activities to ensure equity and fairness in access and engagement.

Significant Individuals: We want to focus on how the persistence and determination of significant individuals, from all backgrounds, have positively influenced the world in which we live and celebrate their achievements and contributions. We have considered how we can represent a variety of people in all of our subjects.

Year 5’s science topic on Space is an example of how we have enhanced our curriculum. As children, our generation will likely know the names of Buzz Aldrin and Neil Armstrong who landed on the moon in 1969. These people are significant but we also need to celebrate the impact different females had on developments in space. Our curriculum now includes learning about the first woman to travel in space (a Russian lady called Valentina Tereshkova) and how three female African-American mathematicians (Katherine Jonson, Mary Jackson and Dorothy Vaughan) played a fundamental role in launching the first man into orbit.

Challenging Stereotypes:

Stereotypes are generalizations about the personal attributes or characteristics of a group of people. For example: looking at two medical professionals and assuming a male is a doctor and not a nurse. 

We want to make sure that we challenge these assumptions to broaden our children’s thinking!  

Our teachers may use carefully chosen images, stories or activities throughout the curriculum to allow the chance to dispel stereotypes. They also allow children opportunities to give alternative ‘truths’. These are all based on what the teacher knows about their class and any stereotyping they may have picked up on. 

Diverse Visuals:

Our teachers ensure that the visuals they choose are inclusive and diverse throughout the curriculum from specific topic studies which discuss stereotypes to the pictures we choose that go alongside our word problems in maths. It’s a simple thing but with mindful selection, our teachers are challenging stereotypes such as fixed gender roles like ‘builders are male’.

Varied visuals also give our children opportunities to raise and discuss ideas that are important to them. For example, when talking about families visuals might be used to allow our children to see different family dynamics including single parent families, adoptive families, families who have grandparents as the head, same sex parents and families without children. This allows our children to explore the world and ask questions in a safe space.

Diverse Texts:

It’s really important that children get to ‘see themselves’ in books, both fiction and non-fiction. Not only should they see themselves but they should also be given the opportunity to see a wide range of people in all sorts of roles including that of the main characters and authors so that they know what’s possible! That’s why Huntingdon Academy has invested in buying new books that diversifies our book corners and chosen teaching texts to be more inclusive and challenge stereotypes.  We also audit our chosen teaching texts to check that we have a range of representation in each year group.