New call for teachers and education professionals to write to Downing Street

The PSHE Association has launched a new call for teachers and other education professionals to write to Downing Street, as it steps up its campaign to persuade the Government of the need for statutory PSHE education.

A recent report suggests that the Government’s main concern is that statutory status would mean a rigidly imposed curriculum for all schools. The new call to action aims to show Downing Street that statutory status would not limit schools’ freedom, and that teachers and other education professionals are passionate about this change.

To support the campaign, follow the instructions below - even if you have written to Downing Street before on this matter.

You can write to Number 10 using their contact form and to save you time, we have prepared the following text for you to use (please note the text has been written for teachers specifically but if you work in a different role you can edit the first line of the text accordingly).

1. Visit the Prime Minister contact form
2. Fill in your name, address, email and the text below (or your own text if you prefer)
3. Press send
4. Verify your response by clicking on the link in the automated confirmation email you receive
5. Email as many colleagues as you can and ask them to write to Downing Street.

Subject line:

Statutory PSHE education and freedom for schools 

Suggested text to be inserted:

As a teacher, I call on the Prime Minister to make PSHE education a statutory subject with the flexibility for schools to tailor provision to their own priorities.

Statutory status is not about requiring schools to follow a rigid curriculum, but is a commitment to ensuring all pupils receive lessons tailored to their needs, planned in consultation with parents, communities and local businesses and delivered by trained teachers.

This protection is needed because PSHE education is the only non-statutory and non-examined school subject, meaning that it often falls off the curriculum in schools, as demonstrated by Ofsted and Department for Education data.

88% of teachers, and five leading teaching unions, including the National Association of Headteachers, support statutory status: they don’t see it as a burden but as a vital step towards keeping pupils healthy, safe and prepared for life and work in modern Britain.