Equality

Equality Code

At Hatton Hill, we believe that the Equality Act 2010 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.

We recognise that these duties reflect international human rights standards as expressed in the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child, the UN Convention on the Rights of People with Disabilities, and the Human Rights Act 1998.

The Public Sector Equality Duty or “general duty”, requires all public organisations, including schools to:

• Eliminate unlawful discrimination, harassment and victimisation;

• Advance equality of opportunity between different groups;

• Foster good relations between different groups.

• We expect all members of the school community and visitors to support our commitment to promoting equalities and meeting the requirements of the Equality Act. We will provide training, guidance and information to enable them to do this.

At Hatton Hill School, we agree to treat everyone equally and fairly, regardless of:

• Age

• Gender

• Disability

• Race and Nationality

• Religion or Belief

• Pregnancy

• Marriage & Civil Partnership

• Transgendered Identity

• Sexual Orientation

We believe that diversity is a strength which should be respected and celebrated by all those who learn, teach and visit us.

Therefore, we:

• Do our best to ensure that everyone is treated fairly and with respect.

• Make sure the school is a safe, secure and stimulating place for everyone.

• Recognise that people have different needs and understand that treating people equally does not always involve treating them all exactly the same.

• Recognise that for some pupils extra support is needed to help them to achieve and be successful.

• Do our best to make sure that people from different groups are consulted and involved in our decisions, for example through talking with pupils and parents and carers, and through our School Council.

A Reader Lives Many Lives

At Hatton Hill, stories are important to us. We use stories to learn about the lives of others developing skills of empathy and a wider understanding of the challenges faced by different people within the local and global community. Our School Council chose the No Outsiders project to help children promote community cohesion preparing children for life as global citizens.

Opening Worlds - the humanities and multiculturalism, diversity and social injustice

Our Key Stage 2 humanities curriculum builds on learning in EYFS and Key Stage 1 by uniquely addressing the study of humans in society through time, including:

Multi-culturalism and diversity - understanding the origins of diversity, valuing the multiple contributions, contributing positively to harmonious diverse communities, challenging racist assumptions wherever we find them

Social injustice - hearing the voices of the disadvantaged, the marginalised and oppressed; understanding how power can work; challenging exploitation and injustice

Multi-culturalism and diversity

Scope: multi-culturalism, across the globe, and especially in Britain is probably the most salient and constant theme of the whole programme. The study of ancient civilisations, is fundamental to understanding what unites rather than divides us, while also celebrating its diverse manifestations. The cradle of civilisations in the Middle East – from where Jews, Christians and Muslims all emerge – points to our common ancestry, to how valued traditions emerge, to the bigger patterns of human interaction. On this foundation, the stories and settings chosen for history repeatedly show examples (e.g. depth on Cordoba in Southern Spain) of contrasting faith communities collaborating in life and work, and displaying mutual respect, or failing to collaborate, failing to comprehend one another, initiating fear and suffering the consequences. The very strong central thread of multi-cultural Britain is woven throughout the history programmes, so that by Year 6, in history, geography and RE, sophisticated studies of the diversity of London, especially the rich contributions of diverse communities to the arts, is possible.

Coherence: multi-cultural settings and multi-cultural Britain never just surface from nowhere. The temporal, geographical and religious dimensions are carefully taught so that pupils can see the bigger picture and respect complexity in their enquiries.

Rigour: understanding that even the questions we ask are affected by our assumptions. How do we make sure we are listening to the ways in which certain stories have been silenced? Are we asking better and better questions in order to tackle issues in how silent voices are heard, how certain peoples have been (and still are) oppressed, how our own values might be shaped by narrow assumptions? Across the programme, pupils will learn how historical questions, geographical questions, religious and philosophical questions, and so forth, can help us to do justice to our study of the past,

our study of place and our study of cultures and beliefs.

Sequencing: each new component of knowledge that relates to this issue builds on the last and prepares for the next so that the cumulative effect of knowledge about and disposition to protect, nurture and value diverse societies has very strong roots in knowledge and in disciplinary thinking.

Social Injustice

Scope: the history topics are socially broad; all types of people are giving voice, made visible and understood in the context of the wider power structures and ideas that affected how they lived. Examples of the disadvantaged and oppressed are extensive in the Opening Worlds humanities programme with very particular case studies used to deepen knowledge, combat stereotypes and think through problem-solving solutions in the past and possibilities for the future, for example, in geography, the study of the favelas in Bolivia, in history the study of the poor in all the societies covered, the treatment of the poor and attitudes towards the poor (positive and negative) in various religious communities and a constant return to London so that the local impact of global trends and shifts is surfaced, with its consequences for diverse peoples.

Coherence: the above links up profoundly within and across subjects. By understanding the context of South America, the reasons why settlements grow, the patterns of power and land-use, pupils have a huge amount of knowledge to draw on when they reach their study of how and why the favelas emerged, why stereotypes emerge and why they are damaging and possibilities are for improvement through empowerment.

Rigour: good historical and geographical questions will foreground the causes, consequences, patterns of change, significance and diversity within communities that were oppressed and marginalised within the past. Pupils will learn how to interrogate diverse sources of evidence and to understand that a central challenge for historians is to render past suffering visible, when very often the poor leave far fewer traces behind them in buildings, art and writings, than the wealthy.

Sequencing: while the incidence of stories about and problems concerning disadvantage will be extensive in all three subjects, each new component of knowledge that relates to this issue builds on the last and prepares for the next so that the cumulative effect of knowledge about disadvantage, power imbalances and suffering, and ways of making claims about these things with rigour, leaves pupils with better questions, more curiosity and more intellectual tools with which to act.