Equality and Diversity Toolkit for Schools
On this CD-Rom is provided a series of document for Schools to use in the
development of their equality and diversity policies and procedures.
The legislative requirements of schools with regard to equality and diversity
has increased significantly of late. This resource seeks to combine all
requirements into a single strategy framework.
Contents
What does the Toolkit include?
1. The Equality and Diversity Strategy
p.2
p.3
a. Audit of Functions and Policies
p.4
b. Action Plan (Three-Year)
p.4
c. Appendices
p.5
2. Model Policies
p.5
3. Equality Impact Assessments
p.6
4. Supporting Information
p.6
How to use the documents provided
p.7
Toolkit and all its contents developed for Lincolnshire County Council with the support of:
Novitas Solutions
Plus
www.novitas-solutions.co.uk
What does the Toolkit include?
The documents provided are split between four folders.
Link to Folder
In the first folder, ‘Equality and Diversity Strategy’ is provided all documents
necessary which, when taken together, comprise all policy requirements to
meet legislative requirements of schools.
In the second folder, ‘Model Policies’ is provided several draft policies which
schools may choose to adopt to support their Equality and Diversity Strategy.
In the third folder, ‘Equality Impact Assessments’ is provided draft Equality
Impact Assessments (EIAs) on school policies and strategies in order to
progress your adoption and implementation of the Equality and Diversity
Strategy and action plans.
In the final folder, ‘Supporting Information’ is provided a series of aides to
communicate equality and diversity information throughout school staff, these
include summaries of legislation, a brief presentation, and a comprehensive
analysis of socio-economic statistics in Lincolnshire into which to put the
context of your school.
2
1. The Equality & Diversity Strategy
The term ‘Strategy’ is used to describe several documents taken together.
The Strategy thus comprises the ‘Equality Scheme for Schools’ in addition to
its ‘Audit’. ‘Action Plan’ and three guidance appendices.
Link to Folder
The Equality & Diversity Scheme is written in such a way that it includes
statutory policies anticipated of the school (two versions are provided, one in
accessible font size, and another more condensed):

Race Equality Policy

Disability Equality Scheme

Accessibility Plan

Gender Equality Scheme

Equality policies on:
o Age
o Religion or Faith
o Sexual Orientation

Racist Incidents Policy

Inclusions Statement

SEN Policy
The narrative sections of the Strategy include all areas that the School would
be expected to cover, these are generic to cover all ‘strands’ of equality, but
specific chapters add detail where needed
The Educational Inclusion Policy meets schools’ requirements for an Inclusion
Policy and an SEN Policy.
3
Audit of Functions and Policies
An audit of functions and policies is provided which gives a proven means of
identifying what actions are needed for the action plan (again, an expectation
for the development of equality schemes).
Link to Folder
Statutory equality schemes require that such an audit is undertaken on
‘functions and policies’ in order to identify both what the school needs to
undertake equality impact assessments on, and also to prioritise the
importance of these. Thus, the draft audit attached seeks to identify all those
policies that you have in place, and the functions that you deliver where there
might not be written policies. An assessment of ‘relevance’ is made for each
function/policy, that is to say, whether that function/policy is relevant to the
legislative requirements i.e. eliminate unlawful discrimination, promote positive
attitudes.
Action Plan (three-year)
In order to comply with the requirements for a Disability and Gender Equality
Scheme, a 3-year action plan is required (you do not have a Scheme in place
without)
An action plan is included also. The structure of this plan is such that it also
provides you with an Accessibility Plan by virtue of the sub-section headings
used. A column is included which shows which ‘strand’ of the equality agenda
the action is designed to deliver. Thus, all actions reading ‘disability’ comprise
the Disability Equality Scheme and Accessibility Plan.
4
The actions included stem from the results of the audit of functions and
policies, and include statutory requirements also.
Link to Folder
Appendices
Three appendices are provided; these document the school’s guidelines on
key areas of legislative requirement.
The first documents the procedure for undertaking Equality Impact
Assessments. The second gives guidance on how to develop monitoring,
where required. The third gives guidance on consultation and engagement
with stakeholders and the school community from an equality and diversity
perspective.
Link to Folder
2. Model Policies
Three model policies have been developed which schools may choose to
develop. These are in areas of school activity where there is more discretion
and variance between schools, but they are mandatory policies with relevance
to equality and diversity:

Child Protection Policy

Collective Worship Policy

Sex Education Policy
5
These policies are only provided as ‘model’ policies and so are still subject to
school development, consultation and necessary procedure.
Link to Folder
3. Equality Impact Assessments
To further assist schools, Equality Impact Assessments have been
undertaken on the Strategy, Racist Incident Policy and Educational Inclusion
Policy (as well as the model policies for Collective Worship and Child
Protection).
Link to Folder
Also in this folder is provided the template for undertaking Equality Impact
Assessments (EIAs) and a ‘Frequently Asked Questions’ page on EIAs.
4. Supporting Information
Within this folder is a series of condensed and accessible guides to the
equality and diversity legislative context. One for each of the six ‘strands’ of
equality, and another that gives an overview to them all. There is also
guidance on the National SEN Code of Practice, and what a Race Equality
Policy for schools is. The intention of these documents is to provide a
resource which teachers, staff and Governors can use to familiarise
6
themselves with the equality and diversity context, and whereupon further
sources of information are provided for those seeking further detail.
There is also a copy of the Local Labour Market Assessment undertaken for
Lincolnshire County Council. This document assesses the population and
economy of the County and its Districts from an equality perspective, and
though sizeable, enables the school to locate comparative data which it may
need on age groups, skills, population etc.
Link to Folder
How to use the documents provided
1. Insert School’s own name and logo
In the first instance, all documents have areas highlighted which need
Schools to insert their own details to brand the documents as their own.
2. Assess Scheme Content
Secondly, the content of the ‘Equality Scheme’ (1.1) needs to be assessed
to ensure that you are comfortable with the phrasing and commitments. I
have sought to produce documents which any school, secondary or
primary, maintained or otherwise, can adopt. As such, you may feel that
you wish to add to some of the content locally.
3. Assess Audit of Functions and Policies
The audit (1.3) needs to be reviewed to ensure that you are comfortable
with its content, and to add anything further that you wish (if you are
adding actions that are ‘relevant’, you will need to develop further actions
for the action plan)
7
4. Assess Action Plan
The action plan (1.4) needs to be assessed against your capacity, and to
check accuracy. Being a 3-year plan, the start date can be when you adopt
the Strategy, or you may choose to vary the length of Year 1 to converge
with the school year. Please bear in mind that the additional resources that
we provide in this toolkit will directly deliver some of these requirements for
you.
5. Consultation
Once you are content with the documentation. Staff should have the
opportunity to comment, and you may wish to undertake local consultation
with parents and pupils. Strictly, consultation is seen as part of the
development of Equality Schemes, however as an annual review is
anticipated, I have built in actions for consultation which give you the
opportunity to ‘commence’ and revise the action plans dependent on the
output of such consultations.
6. Adoption of the Equality Scheme (inc. Action Plan)
Thereafter, the management team and Governors need to adopt the
Strategy, it then needs to be published (these actions and those related
are included in Year 1 of the Plan).
This adoption includes the Equality Scheme document and the relevant
Equality Impact Assessment, together with the Action Plan (without which,
you do not have a statutory scheme). In your report, you may wish to
include your audit of functions and policies and any comments arising from
your consultation. The report should also iterate the timetable for progress
reporting, and the triennial review of the Scheme.
7. Model Policies
The model policies provided are for areas of school administration
whereupon more discretion and local variance is anticipated, these are
8
however policies mandated of schools, and have links to the equality and
diversity agenda. As such, model policies (and EIAs for them) are provided
which the School may choose to utilise.
8. Supporting Information
The information provided should be made available to teachers, staff and
Governors to give them ready access to overviews of the legislative context
into which the School’s Equality Strategy fits. In particular, those teachers
and staff with specific responsibilities for parts of the agenda i.e. HR, SEN,
pupil data should be given the information as part of their development
needs. A brief slideshow presentation is provided which can be used to
give a context to the development and adoption of the Equality Strategy.
9. Implementing the Action Plan
Following adoption of the Strategy, the action plan needs to be
implemented, and progress reported, over a three-year period as the plan
is structured. This will require actions to be cascaded to relevant persons.
Many of the actions, particularly in the first year of the plan, can be
delivered using the information provided and/or will already be in place.
Further activities on monitoring and HR practice, can be delivered with
support from Lincolnshire County Council who have undertaken relevant
EIAs and development to the HR support they provide to schools and are
developing a revised monitoring system.
It is important to notice the incremental nature of the action plan i.e. that in
the second year, actions are in place to analyse the output of monitoring
systems put in place in the first year, thus there are dependencies year-onyear within the plan.
10. Monitoring
With the output of monitoring information, the school should undertake an
impact assessment on the output i.e. is there a higher percentage of
disciplinaries taken against ethnic minority pupils than the proportion they
represent in the school. It can be seen therefore that it is important to get
the ‘baseline’ information on pupils, staff and potentially also parents in
order to conduct future work necessary under statute.
9
Following such activities, it is possible that discrepancies will be identified,
these will require new actions to be inputted into the action plan, whether
they are positive action, research, revisions to processes or continued
monitoring.
Where such exercises are undertaken, and monitoring data is analysed, it
should be included into the annual report process described in the Scheme
and reported to relevant decision-makers, Lincolnshire County Council
where such data is needed at a Countywide level (and to enable the
development of a Countywide comparator), and to stakeholders such as
parents as is relevant.
11. Annual Reporting
The Scheme suggests that progress be reported in the School
Improvement Plan and Self-Evaluation Form (where applicable) and
wherever the School feels it appropriate. You may feel that a separate
stand-alone annual report is more appropriate. Such a report should detail
progress against your action plan – those activities undertaken, the results
of any impact assessments and monitoring outturns, the results of
consultations, new policies developed during the year (these should have
EIAs included and also consultation results), and proposed actions for
future years.
The report needs to go to your decision-makers, and be made available to
all stakeholders of the School.
12. Review of the Scheme
The action plan can be revised to include any new actions you identify, you
may choose therefore to review it annually to have a continual 3-year plan,
in effect therefore having a new Equality Scheme each year as opposed to
every three years. In this circumstance, you must ensure that you consult
on the new Scheme (this is the practice of Lincolnshire County Council).
Otherwise, every three years, you need to review your Scheme in its
entirety. This involves reviewing all policies to ensure that they are up-todate, engaging with stakeholders to both confirm your proposals and also
to proffer their priorities and views to you on what should be done. In such
exercises, and throughout the lifetime of your Equality Scheme, you should
10
make every effort to engage with all users, but particularly those affected
by the Scheme (and those that represent them) i.e. disabled pupils,
disabled parents etc. There are Countywide fora which the School can
access if local arrangements are not viable, however the School will need
to factor in the timescales necessary for such groups to receive, and
comment on, school proposals.
13. Consultation
This is an area within the action plan, and explicit within legislation. The
School needs to identify, develop or access consultative arrangements that
are pertinent to the School’s development and equality activities. As such,
the School may need to develop the means to consult with disabled pupils,
disabled staff and also disabled parents – disability itself can be physical,
sensory or learning related, as such, a single mechanism may not be
appropriate.
In all consultation activities, the School therefore needs to be certain that
that which it proposes for consultation is accessible to those groups and is
conducted in whichever way is most appropriate. Therefore, to consult such
groups on how they wish to be consulted is potentially the best starting
point (where localised). Countywide groups exist which Lincolnshire County
Council Children’s Services can assist you in identifying and accessing.
11