Would you send your child to an unsafe school? Head of Education Steve Beegoo writes on the dangers some school children face.
As we reflect on another Christmas season passing by, many of us will have enjoyed time with children. Those young, excitable, immature, needy but so precious image-of-God bearers! Families and churches have recognised again how special these years are, and often recognise this afresh as a new year commences. It is our God-given responsibility to lead them safely and boldly into the future. And surely…
We would not knowingly, send our children, every day, into a building that was unsafe?
We would not knowingly, send our children, every day, to people that were unsafe?
Would we?
Unsafe buildings
In June this year we were told that 1 in 3 state school buildings were in need of immediate repair. This week we are told that, due to the lack of funding for repairs, the risk of many school buildings collapsing is, ‘very likely’. Is the school building for the children in our area, our children’s school, really about to collapse?
The DfEs own risk assessment report is damning, and states as clearly as possible to all who will listen that the very buildings our children are entering may be crumbling and critically unsafe. In a list of key risks the DfE say they are ‘managing’,
“There is a risk of collapse of one or more blocks in some schools which are at or approaching the end of their designed life-expectancy and structural integrity is impaired. The risk predominantly exists in those buildings built in the years 1945 to 1970 which used ‘system build’ light frame techniques”
The money which is available will only scratch the surface and hundreds of schools in disrepair and ‘at risk of closure’ were recently rejected for government funding. How many accidents are waiting to happen as with the school in London this summer? If in 2022 7,100 schools of 21,000 surveyed schools received the worst possible rating for safety, should parents start 2023 by asking schools how safe are their children?
Unsafe teaching
Yet it is not only the physical safety of children that parents need to consider.
Throughout the last year, Miriam Cates MP exposed the unsafe teaching occurring under the banner of Relationships and Sex Education across the country. Organisations are widely being welcomed into schools to teach children about sexual activities, gender ideology and sexuality, inappropriately stirring confusion, and explaining who children are as developing sexual people.
Mermaids, one of the scores of organisations which have been training teachers, has finally been exposed for sending breast binders to children, and has been removed from the DfE list of wellbeing resource providers. Nevertheless, activist teachers and students in schools are increasingly being welcomed to run clubs, ‘diversity’ events and assemblies, all promoting and celebrating LGBTQ ideology to children.
Given the rapid change in state school culture, is it any wonder that from 2014 to 2020 there was a quadrupling of 16-24 year olds identifying as bisexual, according to the Office for National Statistics. By 2026 on this trajectory, of the predicted 7 million 16-24-year-olds, 1.5 million (20%) will identify as bisexual (20%) and 300,000 (4%) as lesbian or gay. 25% (1 in 4) are expected to see themselves as LG or B – identities which, once owned, lead people away from a biblical understanding of who they are created to be.
Teaching children to have their main identifying characteristic in terms of sexuality, and sexual or gender expression leads children into unsafe territory. They are led into early sexualisation, confusion about their sex and are deterred from following Christian teaching about identity and what activities are right for your God-given body. Is your local school encouraging children into accepting unsafe sexual practices and damaging their mental, physical and spiritual health?
Parents have the right, according to Ofsted and the Secretary of State, to see what is being taught to their children about sex education; parents should request it.
‘Sexposed’
To help families, leaders, and teachers think through these issues, Christian Concern will be working with teacher and organiser Bobbi Kumari and the ‘Sexposed’ event in March. Bobbi explains:
‘The sexual perversion currently permeating our world defies rationality and common sense. It ventures far beyond lunacy and delusion. In fact there is only one word to describe it – demonic. And as if the demonic assault on marriage, the attack on the nuclear family, the normalisation of promiscuity, the rise of homosexuality, the celebration of abortion, the barrage of porn in the mainstream, the glorification of sex trafficking and nonstop perversion in arts, media, education and culture, wasn’t enough – we now have paedophilia becoming acceptable, we have drag queens in libraries, kids on hormone replacement therapy and teens being castrated by the thousands. This simply cannot continue, on our watch!’
‘As the body of Christ, we can no longer afford to remain passive, timid or on the mere defensive. We must be on the offensive, for we carry the best news ever. We must rise up. We must get clued up – we must start upholding the truth of God’s Word concerning biblical sexuality – with boldness and with love. And we must provide the only solution to the perversion and brokenness that enslaves this generation – which is Christ. Otherwise our families and our precious children are going to be completely destroyed – for generations to come.’
‘Whether you are a parent, educator, leader, you are married, single, a young adult or a child, SEXPOSED: The Conference is for you. At Sexposed, you will be exposed to the lies influencing our own sexuality, our culture, our marriages, our children and even our churches, but you will find great hope, encouragement and joy in the truth of God’s Word concerning sexuality. You will be ministered to, awakened, equipped and mobilised, to be a defender of God’s Word, to be salt and light, a preserver of innocence and purity, and a bold and countercultural voice of truth, love and hope in our sexually broken generation – and for generations to come!’
Taking action
As we consider our children, and the unsafe environments provided by society, we must act as Bobbi explains. The physical walls of our schools are cracked. The Christian foundations of our schools are crumbling.
How will we lead our children into 2023? How would the Good Shepherd have us lead his lambs? We must pray, asking the Lord what he would have us do with His children. We must write to our schools, and raise our voice, asking about the safety of our vulnerable children. We must be trained to understand the issues and to see the responses God calls of us. Perhaps you might consider booking into the ‘Sexposed’ conference.
And we must ask the difficult questions. Surely we would not, knowingly, send our children, every day, into a building that was unsafe? We would not, knowingly, send our children, every day, to people that were unsafe? Would we?
To find out more about how to be counter-cultural in an overtly sexualised education system, sign up to join us at a new conference, Sexposed, running from 30 March to 1 April.
