Gender in Schools
In recent years, schools have become an important route through which students encounter views on gender, identity, and transition. Much of what schools offer under the heading of “inclusion” goes beyond providing information: it contains normative claims about biological sex and gender identity that are scientifically and socially contested. This directly concerns parental responsibility and the neutrality that education should maintain.
Related topics can be found in Trans and Education Internationally.
What are students being taught?
Alongside regular lessons on sexuality and citizenship, schools use materials from advocacy organisations. One example is the Paarse Vrijdag (Purple Friday) handbook by COC Netherlands for education professionals (secondary and vocational education, 2025). It describes social transition at school as a matter for which the school must adapt: according to the handbook, social transition can “bring uncertainty and discomfort”, for example when “being addressed by the right name” and when using the toilets and changing rooms, which makes transgender and non-binary students feel “misunderstood and unwelcome” (source). The handbook does not mention the Cass Review. According to this site, concepts such as an “inner gender identity” and sex being “assigned” at birth are theoretical positions, not established facts; according to this site, sex is observed at birth, not assigned. The origins of this wording are explained on letterbrij.nl. An example from abroad is Australian teaching material that removes sex from biology lessons.
Under Article 8(3) of the Dutch Primary Education Act (Wet primair onderwijs), primary education must in any case visibly aim at knowledge of and respect for differences in, among other things, sex and sexual orientation (source). Students’ own views are revealed by University of Amsterdam research among more than 31,000 pupils. Regarding English secondary schools, the Policy Exchange think tank wrote in March 2023 in its report Asleep at the Wheel that only 28 percent of schools reliably inform parents once a child reports gender distress; of the 304 schools contacted, 154 responded in whole or in part (source).
The affirmation-first approach
The Cass Review writes that schools struggle with the question of how to respond when a student wants to socially transition at school, and that the importance of what happens at school cannot be underestimated (para. 12.6). According to the report, social transition within the NHS should be regarded as an active intervention, because it can have significant effects on psychological functioning and longer-term outcomes (para. 12.5). Owing to the weakness of the research, it is however unclear whether social transition changes the course of gender development (para. 12.31); the report considers it possible that social transition in childhood changes the trajectory of gender identity development and therefore advises a more cautious approach for children than for adolescents (para. 12.36; source). See the Cass Review (2024).
On 19 December 2023, the English Department for Education (DfE) published draft guidance stating that schools need not accept all requests for social transition, that parents must be fully consulted and that primary school children should not be given different pronouns (source). On 12 February 2026, the DfE proposed incorporating this guidance into the safeguarding guidance Keeping children safe in education (source). The British organisation Safe Schools Alliance UK campaigns to uphold child safeguarding in schools.
Parental consent
The Cass Review heard from many parents that their child had been socially transitioned and affirmed in the chosen gender identity without their involvement, usually after an adolescent came out at school (para. 12.16). According to the report, parents should be actively involved in decision-making unless there are strong grounds to believe that this would put the child or young person at risk, and advice on the risks and benefits of social transition in young children is not a task for staff without appropriate clinical training (para. 12.36; source). In the US city of Portland, a mother filed a lawsuit against the school district over the school’s gender policy and a restraining order she received after distributing protest letters in August 2026. Parents’ rights, from the right to information to participation rights, are explained on genderopschool.nl.
Bullying and safety
Every student deserves a safe school environment, especially students who deviate from group norms. A safe school requires clear behavioural rules and proper supervision, not identity-political programmes. Combining safety policy with activist teaching materials unnecessarily makes the debate about bullying controversial and can set parents and schools against each other.
Education and scientific nuance
Good education presents controversial subjects as controversial. According to this site, instead of a single narrative, students should learn the state of affairs: that, according to this site, there are two biological sexes; that the Cass Review writes that children with early gender incongruence are most likely to desist before puberty, although the incongruence persists in a small number (see desistance); that the systematic reviews by the University of York for the Cass Review found a lack of high-quality research on puberty blockers (of 50 studies, 1 was of high, 25 of moderate and 24 of low quality); and that the Finnish guideline (2020) and the Swedish guideline (2022) were the only two the Cass Review could recommend. At the same time, in June 2026 the Dutch Health Council saw no reason to change care for young people in the Netherlands (source). Without this nuance, according to this site, it is not education but indoctrination.