On 19 December 2023, the Department for Education (DfE) released a consultation on draft, non-statutory guidance for schools regarding 'gender-questioning children', which ran until 12 March 2024. Once finalised, the guidance is intended to provide practical advice to help schools and colleges make decisions regarding children who are questioning their gender.
Note that once finalised the non-statutory guidance will apply only to schools in England. Guidance for schools in Wales is also expected but has not yet been published. Northern Ireland's Education Authority published non-statutory guidance in 2019 (updated in 2021).
Until a final response from the government is released, this guidance remains under consultation and is therefore not currently agreed policy. This means that while members may wish to review the draft guidance when considering any approaches, it is important to underline that you do not need to change your current policies at this stage.
Having engaged with members and utilised insight from advice queries we receive from members around this, NAHT has submitted a response to the consultation on behalf of members. However, given the complexities of this and the different contexts that members are in, we also encouraged all members to submit their own responses to the consultation.
