I am (as far as I know) the only out member of staff in my school. And I don’t just mean out trans member of staff, I mean that (as far as I know) I’m the only adult in my whole institution that is any flavour of rainbow.

You might think, ‘wow that’s amazing, you’re so brave’, but the truth is that I always add the (as far as I know) caveat, especially when I’m talking about it in school, because I always hope that I’ll be corrected. I always want the next sentence to be someone cutting me off with “Oh no actually, Gopal from Art has a husband” or “You might not have heard yet but Mr Finnegan is a Miss now, her new name is Sarah”.

I don’t want to be the only one any more. It’s lonely.

Trans theatre maker Tabby Lamb summed this feeling up amazingly in a recent social media post about the fact she is about to be the first out trans woman to have their play performed at The Globe Theatre, “I’d rather be the fifteenth than the first, as firsts really don’t do much, especially if there’s no lasting change after ‘the first’ “. Just having one of us isn’t enough anymore.

Don’t get me wrong, I do have allies. My department are great and have been absolutely instrumental in getting me the support I needed when I’ve run into issues with students and policy. I also run the LGBT+ group in my school as a joint effort with our Equality and Diversity Lead. She does a lot of the behind the scenes stuff, because I’m a TA and don’t get PPA to do it in, and I do a lot of the student facing, out and proud, rainbow flag flying stuff. I’m The Face of the Movement.

It’s amazing seeing the students light up when they realise that their teacher is like them. That they have someone truly in their corner, someone they can count on. I walk around school every day with my four different pride pins and my ‘you are safe with me’ pin on my lanyard and it gets students talking. Straight cis kids ask me why I have so many pride pins, what the differences between them are and then say thank you because they learned how to support their friend better. Queer kids ask me for coming out advice and I invite them to come join us for Friends of Dorothy on Fridays. But being the face of the movement means I also get the bad stuff too. Like being the one person who has to be constantly on the ball around trans kids names and pronouns so I can jump in and correct in meetings and staffroom chat, because if I don’t, no one else will. Like the kids who harassed me in the corridors for months because “I know it’s bad now and I’m really sorry, but I’d never met someone like you before and didn’t know what to do about it”. Like feeling like you have to be an exemplary queer person at all times, because you’re the only positive role model these kids, and sometimes staff, have got so if you mess up it reflects badly on all of us. Like the well meaning colleagues who tell you in detail about the homophobic and transphobic incidents in their classrooms and ask if they handled it right, as if you are the one authority on the subject and not considering that hearing about and dealing with this every day takes its toll. Most of these things get easier on each individual member of staff with each new out colleague to share the load, but being the only one means you’re carrying the burden alone. This impact is compounded by the fact for me I’m also one of two visibly disabled staff so I’m carrying the burden for ableism too.

I keep saying I’m the only ***out*** member of staff, because it’s statistically impossible for me to be the only LGBT+ staff member in my school. According to the Office of National Statistics, 3.2% of the populations of England and Wales identified as LGB and 0.5% of people identified somewhere under the trans umbrella. NEU statistics of its members found that 3.8% identified as LGBT+. That means that, statistically, there should be at least four of us in school. When the NEU surveyed its LGBT+ members in 2022, only 9% of participants were out to most or all people at work, with gay women and trans and non-binary people finding it the hardest to be out. But why? To be an LGBT+ member of staff in a school, not only do you need to feel confident enough in yourself to let others in and tell them who you are, but you need to be able to handle LGBT+phobia from students. Then when you have to call their parents, you risk the same harassment from them too as that’s often where they learn that behaviour from. You have to deal with difficult colleagues and policies that makes everything from getting dressed to come to work, to using the bathroom, even down to telling students and colleagues your name a battle where there absolutely doesn’t need to be one. If you want to fight this, you spend months trying to get all the stakeholders in a room at once to review the policy, if they’re even willing to come to the table at all. Even if you have a good school that does everything right, you still have the constant worry that those people in power who are keeping school safe for you might leave and be replaced by others who don’t share those values.

Staff aren’t willing to be out, because being out requires feeling safe.

One thing that will definitely make this problem worse will be the proposed DfE guidance on Trans and Non-Binary students. If this guidance comes into effect, it will force LGBT+ (and especially TNB educators) to either betray their morals, their identity and their students, or leave the profession. Many other educators I have met through my life outside of my school have told me that they will be actively refusing to follow this guidance if it comes into effect, up to the point of being fired if necessary, myself included. We already have a recruitment problem in this industry and if LGBT+ people are leaving in droves, either by choice or by force, our children will suffer and the load will become a bigger burden to bear for those staff who are left. We cannot allow this guidance to pass.

Now, I don’t want to leave this article on a note of hopelessness, so here are some ideas of how allies can support your LGBT+ colleagues. Getting involved in your union is an amazing way to support your LGBT+ siblings. Ensuring all of your colleagues are aware of the work of TNB, the TNB toolkit, and your union’s LGBT+ Inclusion Charter. This is especially important for colleagues you think aren’t LGBT+. Cisgender heterosexual colleagues will be less likely to find this information in other places as they won’t actively be looking for it, and you probably have colleagues who are queer but aren’t out yet. Making sure everyone has access to this information shows those people you’re an ally and might make them feel safe to take that first step to being out in school.

Making sure you have intersectional LGBT+ content in your lessons is also a great way to support your colleagues. You might think this is just beneficial for the students, but I felt able to come out as non-binary because I could see how out and proud my students were and they inspired me, and if your colleagues see you making that effort, it again shows them you’re a safe person to turn to should they need support.

If you do have out colleagues, or any colleagues who have marginalised identities, find out what issues affect them and offer to take on the battle for them, or help them fight it. Being marginalised often means we are fighting to get through the day every day, and therefore often don’t have the energy to fight battles like policy, so support is often really appreciated. This approach is often incredibly helpful in the event that we experience abuse and harassment in school too. A year ago. one of my colleagues experienced a horrific racist incident and was in no fit state to complete all the admin and SLT chasing required to get the issue dealt with. What we did in that situation was that she described the incident to me in as much detail as she was capable of and then I did all the admin for her and explained in the ClassCharts logs and emails that she had given me permission to act on her behalf. It meant that she could take her time to recover and the incident was dealt with faster as I had the energy to keep chasing people.

I truly think that LGBT+ people make incredibly gifted educators. We have a deep inner drive to make sure that all students are treated fairly and bringing our different perspectives and culture into the classroom helps ensure each child’s education is truly well rounded. But in order to do that we need to feel safe and protected. The education system needs to change.