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YOU ARE HERE Communities > Rainbow Teachers

Rainbow Teachers

 

PPTA's Rainbow Taskforce for Safe Schools has been operating for about 14 years. Its job is to help make secondary schools safe and welcoming places for gay, lesbian, bisexual, transgender and intersex students, family/whanau members and teachers.

pdf icon Affirming diversity of sexualities and gender identities in the school community: guidelines (2012)

link to PPTA webpage About PPTA / PPTA structures & networks for more information

PPTA maintains an email network for members interested in being kept informed about issues for GLBTI teachers and students and about the work of the Rainbow Taskforce.  You don’t have to be GLBTI yourself, just interested in the issues and keen to support PPTA’s work in this area.  The network receives an average of one email per term with news, links to interesting articles, and so on.  If you would like to join this network, email This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it and ask to be added to the list.

Notes from the Rainbow Taskforce meeting 1 Mar 2013

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Notes from the New Zealand Post Primary Teachers' Association (PPTA) Rainbow Taskforce meeting 1 March 2013.

Transgender students
Out @ Work Kamp
Rainbow Network
Pink Shirt Day
Report Back on LGBTTI Symposium
Safer Schools for All workshops
Changes in taskforce membership
PPTA President’s comments

Next meeting is Friday 4 October 2013

Transgender students
We discussed what advice we should be giving to schools about processes when they enrol a student who is transgender.  The Massachusetts material recently received is very helpful, but the legal framework here may be a little different.  There appears to be no best practice across government, and being transgender tends to be problematised instead of normalised.  We agreed to seek advice on this from the Human Rights Commission and to work towards producing some material for schools ourselves.

Link to pdf on external website Guidance for Massachusetts Public Schools Creating a Safe and Supportive School Environment: Nondiscrimination on the Basis of Gender Identity

Out @ Work Kamp
This is in the holidays this time, and we decided to send four members of the Taskforce to the Kamp to represent PPTA.

Link to external website More information about the CTU Out@Work Network

Rainbow Network
The Taskforce was worried that nowhere near all our GLBTI members knew about this email network, even though an invitation to join the list the Network is on our website.  We agreed to try to find more ways to get members to sign up to it.   We also decided to email a summary of each Taskforce meeting to the network so they would be more aware of our work, and put this on the PPTA website.  

Link to PPTA webpage Login to sign up for Rainbow Taskforce e-newsletters

Pink Shirt Day
This is on May 17th this year and is being coordinated by the Mental Health Foundation.  PPTA has not been contacted by them, and we decided to make contact and remind them of our importance to getting things happening in secondary schools on Pink Shirt Day.

Link to external website Pink Shirt Day - Where's the power?

Report Back on LGBTTI Symposium
Lex Davis had attended on PPTA’s behalf a symposium in Auckland titled  ‘LGBTTI Wellness and Suicide: What do we need to change?’ organised by a range of organisations.  It was a really good day.  The key presentations to the symposium can be seen on video.

Link to external website Videos from LGBTTI Wellness and Suicide: What do we need to change?

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Last Updated on Wednesday, 10 April 2013 15:18 Read more...

Rainbow taskforce 2013

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Contact names for the New Zealand Post Primary Teachers' Association / Te Wehengarua (PPTA) Rainbow taskforce representatives. The Rainbow taskforce meets regularly and is happy to hear from members.

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Kia Ora te Whānau – I am the DP at Wairoa College (top of Hawke’s Bay) and consider myself a ‘Kwaussie’ – Sydney born and bred but I have called NZ home for the past 9 years. I have been with my partner for over 10 years and am passionate about supporting our queer youth and staff to achieve their best in safe and supportive environments.		 Wairoa College
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Kia ora te whānau o Te Wehengarua.  I teach Drama at Hamilton Girls’ High School and in my spare time I am a Pasifika mentor and a timetabler, and  organise day relief.  Equity is my biggest interest: that is why I am a trade unionist, and why I am also a PPTA representative on the Waikato CTU LAC and the national CTU Out@Work committees.
 Hamilton Girls' High School
Shawn Cooper Avondale College
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Hi. I am an English teacher and the Year 13 Dean at Newlands College, Wellington, where I have worked for the last 9 years. I am currently a member of the choir 'The Glamaphones' who sing out in Wellington!		 Newlands College
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I teach History at Ormiston Senior College, a new school in Flat Bush, Auckland. I am passionate about social justice and work to share best practice to make schools a better place for our queer whanau.		 Ormiston Senior College
This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it Fairfield College
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Kia ora te whanau. I have worked in secondary for three years and am keen to help rangatahi realise their potential in all areas of achievement. Driving Maori Performing Arts has its many challenges and rewards. Cultural identity, sexual identity and developing a sense of community in both, are necessary and equal parts when building strong foundations for our students' future.		 Tararua College
This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it PPTA National Office
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Last Updated on Tuesday, 30 April 2013 09:45

Safe classrooms for all. Anti-homophobia workshops in schools

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Speaking out - antihomophobia workshops article graphicThe New Zealand Post Primary Teachers' Association (PPTA) Rainbow Taskforce report on their "Safe classrooms for all" anti-homophobia workshops in schools.

Speaking out

A trial of anti-homophobia workshops in schools this year has been a huge success with demand well exceeding expectations.

Offered through PPTA’s rainbow taskforce, the “Safe Classrooms for All” workshops were designed to help staff deal with issues around homophobia and transphobia and the impact this has on gay and transgender students.

PPTA advisory officer Judie Alison, who presented the workshops along with rainbow taskforce members Lex Davis and Jo Belgrave, said extra sessions had to be arranged to meet demand from schools.

“The invitation sent out to schools said that because 2012 was a trial year we would be able to offer only 10 workshops — but the demand was far in excess of what we had expected. In total there were inquiries from 21 different schools,” she said.

At the time of writing 15 workshops had been held in a wide range of schools — area schools, co-ed and single-sex, urban and provincial and high and low decile.

Judie said many teachers were surprised by figures presented that showed LGBTI (lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender and intersex) students were over-represented in alcohol, drug and self-harm statistics.

Results from the Youth ’07 report — a health and wellbeing study of 8000 secondary students from years 9 to 13 — showed that suicide attempt figures over a 12-month period were five times higher for same/both-sex attracted students than their opposite-sex attracted peers and that three times as many were bullied at school on a weekly basis.

Judie said the study, conducted by the University of Auckland’s faculty of medical and health sciences, gave workshop attendees a stark example of the issues LGBTI students face.

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Last Updated on Wednesday, 27 February 2013 15:19 Read more...

Queer resources for New Zealand secondary schools

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Some useful resources for members and branches to use when working to ensure that their school is a safe and welcoming place for GLBTI students, teachers, and families/whanau.

Download pdf Homophobia

Download pdf Some GLBTI Definitions

Download pdf GLBTI Case studies

This list of Queer resources for New Zealand secondary schools was prepared by Catherine Lee, a former member of PPTA’s Rainbow Taskforce who is a school librarian.

Download pdfQueer resources for New Zealand secondary schools (2005)

From Catherine's introduction:

I have limited this list to books published this century.  Although this means I had to omit such well-written and popular fiction titles as Deliver me from Evie and Am I blue, I want to emphasise the vibrant and exciting new books that are now becoming available.  I have not included periodical articles, as these are now readily available to all NZ schools through the provision, courtesy of the Ministry of Education and the National Library, of the full-text database, EPIC.

Encourage your school library to acquire some of these books!

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Last Updated on Thursday, 10 May 2012 14:29

Youth health and wellbeing

Friday, 29 January 2010 13:24
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"The Youth '07 report on the health and wellbeing of same and both sex attracted secondary school students provides evidence that things have not improved for queer students in New Zealand secondary schools since the early study, Youth 2000.   In fact, on some measures they have got worse."


Youth'07 The health and wellbeing of secondary school students in New Zealand: Results for young people attracted to the same sex or both sexes

The report presents information on the health and wellbeing of secondary school students who reported being sexually attracted to others of the same sex or to both sexes. Information is drawn from the Youth'07 Survey and selected findings are compared with those from the first Youth2000 survey conducted in 2001.

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Last Updated on Friday, 29 January 2010 13:33

Human rights conference at the Asia-Pacific Outgames 2011

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Outgames 2011 - website logo

At least seven New Zealand Post Primary Teachers' Association / Te Wehengarua (PPTA) members attended the human rights conference held in Wellington in March 2011 as part of the Asia-Pacific Outgames.

The conference was a sell-out, with over 300 people attending.  It was an inspiring event, with a wide range of fascinating keynote presentations and great workshops.

Link to external website Information about the Asia-Pacific Outgames Human Rights conference

PPTA presentation to the conference: 'Queering the closeted curriculum in the cardboard classroom'

At the human rights conference at the Asia-Pacific Outgames, PPTA President Robin Duff presented a workshop titled ‘Queering the closeted curriculum in the cardboard classroom.

Download ppt ‘Queering the closeted curriculum in the cardboard classroom’



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Last Updated on Thursday, 30 June 2011 23:16

GLBTI teachers and safe schools

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New Zealand Post Primary Teachers' Association / Te Wehengarua (PPTA) Rainbow Taskforce for Safe Schools (formerly Safe Schools Taskforce) has been operating for about 14 years. Its job is to help make secondary schools safe and welcoming places for gay, lesbian, bisexual, transgender and intersex students, family/whanau members and teachers.

Safe Schools

Schools are institutions where diversity is the norm among staff, students and the community served by the school.   This diversity includes diversity of cultures, ethnicities, beliefs and values, learning needs, sexualities and gender identities.  The first four forms of diversity are generally well-recognised and acted upon.  Yet diversity of sexualities and of gender identities has been less well addressed by schools and many continue to be less than welcoming and affirming of students, staff and families who are not of the dominant heterosexual orientation or gender identities.

There is ample evidence of the harmful effects on people of homophobia (defined as 'the fear or loathing of homosexuality') and transphobia (defined as ‘an irrational fear of, and/or hostility towards, people who are transgender or who otherwise transgress traditional gender norms’) and their manifestation in physical, verbal or psychological harassment of people who are, or are perceived to be, non-heterosexual or transgender.

Affirmation of diversity in all its forms is a fundamental value that must underpin the culture of a school, because without it, conflict is inevitable and a school is no longer a safe and affirming place for all members of its community.

 

 

 

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Last Updated on Thursday, 19 January 2012 10:45

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