Diversity Role Models (DRM) has a vision of a world where everyone embraces diversity and can thrive. Through high quality education and role model storytelling, DRM embed inclusion in schools and build empathy in young people. Working in primary and secondary schools in the UK, primarily in England, students are given a unique opportunity to hear personal lived experience of LGBT+ or ally role models and ask questions in-person and in a safe space: their own classrooms.
Building young people’s empathy in this way allows them to understand the (often unintended) impact of their language and actions, equipping them with the skills to challenge homophobic, biphobic and transphobic comments and bullying happening within the student body, triggering a whole school culture shift to celebrating and embracing difference.
In order to ensure sustained change throughout the whole school, Diversity Role Models supplements their student workshops with training for school staff, governors, and parents/carers.
The workshops and trainings help schools meet statutory obligations under the Equality Act 2010, Fundamental British Values, and Spiritual, Moral, Social and Cultural Development (SMSC) and are aligned to the new Ofsted framework and RSE guidance.
In the 2018-19 school year, Diversity Role Models reached a landmark, delivering to 100,000 students across 400 schools and 4000+ student workshops since launching in 2011.
As a result of the workshops:
- 84% of secondary students said they would support a friend who tells them they are LGBT+
- While 71% of Year 5 and 6 students said they’ve heard the phrase “that’s so gay” in school, 83% indicated they’d be confident to challenge its use following the workshop
- 98% stated the student workshops will have a positive impact on inclusion in school
- 95% of staff and governors stated the training increased confidence in making their schools more LGBT+ inclusive
www.diversityrolemodels.org, info@diversityrolemodels.org
Diversity Role Models is a registered charity in England and Wales (No. 1142548).