New research has challenged claims that parents at Australian religious schools expect or support discrimination against LGBT+ staff or students, revealing the majority in fact oppose it.
A national survey revealed that, across government, Catholic and faith-based independent schools, most parents want their children to be taught inclusivity towards sexual orientation, gender identity and gender diversity, and to reduce homophobia and transphobia. Even among parents who describe themselves as “very” religious, substantial majorities support these principles.
Parents want their child’s school to be inclusive for all
Dr Jacqui Hendriks from the Curtin School of Population Health says the research challenges beliefs about parents’ attitudes towards LGBT+ issues in religious schools.
“Currently, under Federal law, religious educational institutions are permitted to discriminate against students and staff on certain grounds, including based on sexual orientation, pregnancy, or marital status,” Dr Hendriks told The Educator.
“As these laws are being reviewed and debated, it is important that we don't presume parents in faith-based schools hold particular viewpoints or expectations, or want these forms of discrimination to continue.”
Dr Hendriks said individual school sectors and schools should be cautious about assuming the values of the families whose children they educate, or their motivations for enrolment without specifically collecting this data from their parent groups.
The Curtin University study found that regardless of a parent’s religious affiliation, the strength of their religious convictions, or the school sector in which they enrolled their child/ren, significant majorities of parents—ranging from 62.7% to 93.5%—expressed support for schools to be inclusive spaces for individuals with diverse sexual orientations or gender identities, and to actively challenge homophobia and transphobia.
“The very small degree of opposition suggests widespread support for LGBT persons and challenges the assumption that religious families, or those enrolled in faith-based schools, are supportive of discriminative practices.”
Dr Hendriks said the study highlighted that many parents with children in religious schools were in fact not religious themselves, or religion was not very important to their daily life.
“Support for LGBT inclusivity is widespread across all school sectors, though there are some differences,” she said.
“In government schools, levels of parental support for the four attitude statements we asked ranged from 77.0%-88.4%, followed closely by parents in the Catholic school system at 74.3%-86.2%.”
Dr Hendriks noted that parents connected to independent faith-based schools, while still showing majority support, expressed lower levels of support, at 69.9%–80.9%.
“This suggests that while independent religious schools are more conservative, the majority of parents, even in these settings, still support inclusivity for LGBT individuals,” she said.
“Across all three school sectors, parents were more likely to express support for diverse sexuality, with less support for diverse gender identity. However, support for schools to include gender diversity and reduce transphobia was still very high overall [69.9%-77.0%].”
When asked what effect the study’s findings could have on law reforms regarding discrimination in religious schools, Dr Hendriks said they provide strong evidence that could shape law reform aimed at eliminating discrimination in religious schools.
“Despite claims from some groups that current discrimination practices align with parental values, our study showed that most parents—across all school sectors and levels of religiosity—oppose discriminatory practices and support inclusivity,” she said.
“Moving forward, schools need to ensure they are providing comprehensive relationships and sexuality education programs and are creating inclusive and support environments.”
Dr Hendriks said parental engagement plays a critical role ensuring these efforts are successful.
“For this reason, schools should be encouraged to meaningfully consult with families when developing programs or policies,” she said.
“They should also keep schools informed about classroom content to help foster related at-home conversations. Finally, we need to ensure any sexuality education we do provide in schools is respectful of different faith perspectives.”
*The I+ was omitted from the LGBTI+ acronym as the Curtin University researchers did not ask any questions about intersex students.