Written by Jack Lynch
Jack Lynch (they/them) is a writer, educator, and DEI specialist. As Co-Director and Workshops & Training Lead at Pop’n’Olly, they work with schools, educators, parents, and organisations across the UK to create more inclusive environments. Jack has delivered training to thousands of professionals and authored widely used resources that support good practice in diversity, equity, and inclusion in education.
“What can and can’t we teach about LGBTQ+ lives under this new RSE guidance?”
With the new Relationships and Sex Education (RSE) Guidance 2026 set to come into force in England from September, this has been one of the most common questions I’m asked when working with primary school leaders and educators, at the moment.
In our conversations with schools and educators, I am hearing two clear messages. Firstly, the language and messaging of the RSE guidance around LGBTQ+ inclusion is deeply concerning and that, alongside other consultations and revisions of legislation, it’s providing less clarity, more questions, and increased fear and division. Secondly, that it’s making educators want to work even harder to make sure that every child feels like they belong.
With LGBTQ+ bullying significantly increasing and mental wellbeing of LGBTQ+ young people at some of its lowest levels, I am working even harder to empower schools to continue to remain inclusive and show every child that they belong. After spending months scouring the legislation and working with our legal team at Pop’n’Olly to understand what the legislation does and does not say, I can say with absolute confidence that LGBTQ+ inclusive education is not only still possible under RSE 2026, but that the current legislation can be used to provide a framework for it.
So let’s break down what that looks like.
Family and Relationship Diversity
This guidance calls specifically for schools to recognise that “families of many forms provide a nurturing environment for children, and can include single parent families, same-sex parents, families headed by grandparents, young carers, kinship carers, adoptive parents and foster parents/carers” and that “Teaching should illustrate a wide range of family structures in a positive way, and care should be taken to ensure that children are not stigmatised based on their home circumstances.”
This provides a clear message that teaching about family diversity should be truly representative of all families. This provides a brilliant legislative basis for this work, which is a cornerstone of inclusive education in the lower age groups of primary and key to making sure that children from non-traditional family structures can see themselves represented. This positive representation at early ages has been shown to significantly increase the mental wellbeing of all children, providing them with the important messaging that, whatever their family looks like, they belong.
Tackling Stereotyping
The RSE guidance also targets stereotyping, and specifically gender stereotyping, stating that by the end of primary school pupils should know “how stereotypes can be unfair, negative, destructive or lead to bullying and how to challenge a stereotype” as well as saying that schools should “avoid language or activities which repeat or enforce gender stereotypes”.
This focus on challenging negative stereotypes already forms a key part of many schools’ inclusive curricula and is a key element of LGBTQ+ inclusive education, as we know that gender stereotypes often underpin homophobic, biphobic and transphobic bullying. When we teach about diversity, rather than binary gender stereotypes, rates of bullying based on protected characteristics is shown to decrease, which aligns perfectly with school’s duties under the Equality Act 2010 and Public Sector Equality Duty to ‘eliminate discrimination, advance equality of opportunity and foster good relations between people who share a protected characteristic and those who do not.’
Sexuality and Gender Diversity
When it comes to how and when to teach specifically about LGBTQ+ identities, the RSE guidance remains non-specific. In comparison to the equivalent guidance in Scotland and Wales, which integrates LGBTQ+ education into the curriculum, the guidance in England very much leaves this down to the individual schools. However, at no point does the RSE guidance, or any other legislation, state that schools should not teach about LGBTQ+ identities. In fact, it states that children “…should learn about all protected characteristics, including sexual orientation and gender reassignment…” and, indeed, many primary schools are effectively teaching about LGBTQ+ identities in age-appropriate ways that both align with the guidance and improve the mental wellbeing of their pupils.
Of course, LGBTQ+ inclusive education at primary school is also broader than simply teaching about LGBTQ+ identities. It’s about teaching children that families can look different but that all families are characterised by love and care. It’s about teaching children that we aren’t limited to speaking, behaving or dressing in certain ways because of our gender and, finally, teaching children that there are many different ways to be human. All of these things have a solid and clear foundation in this RSE guidance.
I want to be clear, the new RSE guidance and surrounding legislation does NOT mean we have to stop teaching about LGBTQ+ lives, it does NOT mean we have to stop supporting LGBTQ+ pupils. Primary schools can absolutely continue to deliver high quality, LGBTQ+ inclusive education and, importantly, use the RSE guidance and other legislation to strengthen their policies, ethos and inclusion across the whole school community.