Home Depot Partnering with LGBTQ programs We provided elementary school students with information about “pansexual” identity and being “non-binary.”
In 2022, Home Depot announcedDiversity Partnership“Welcoming Schools” is a program run by the Human Rights Campaign that educates students about transgender and LGBTQ terminology. The Welcoming Schools program offers K-12 lesson plans and other LGBTQ resources on its website, which have been available since before Home Depot announced the partnership.
Home Depot announced in June 2022 that the company was expanding its partnership with the Human Rights Council.
“The Human Rights Campaign (HRC) Foundation works to create radical change in the daily lives of LGBTQ+ people,” Home Depot's announcement read. “Home Depot has long partnered with the HRC Foundation to drive meaningful change, but we're expanding our partnership to support multiple initiatives that align with their important work to advance education for all, especially within diverse communities.”
The Human Rights Council describes the Welcoming Schools program as “the most comprehensive bias-based and bullying prevention program in the nation, providing LGBTQ+ and gender-sensitive professional development training, lesson plans, reading lists, and resources designed specifically for educators and youth-serving professionals.”
One of the program's lesson plans involves students in kindergarten through second grade reading a book titled “Red: A Crayon Story.” After reading the book, teachers will lead a session in which students use crayons to explore their “identity.”
“Each student will create a crayon drawing that explores their inner identity,” the lesson plan states.
The goal was to “provide students with an opportunity to share parts of their identity with their classmates and teachers” and to “explore concepts of gender identity with the students.”
“It's important to teach young children that they should not assume someone's gender identity based on their gender expression,” she continued. The lesson plan also gave the example of someone who appears to be a girl but identifies as non-binary, using the pronouns they/them.
Alternative lesson plans Focusing on the “Gender Snowman”“It will help students understand that there are many different ways to be a girl, a boy, both or neither.”
“Help students understand that gender is an inner feeling of being a girl, boy, both, or neither. There are many ways people identify with their gender, and there are many genders,” the lesson plan states. “To explain this simply to students: when a baby is born, a doctor or midwife looks at the baby's body and anatomy and says it's a girl, boy, or intersex. But babies can't talk yet, so they can't communicate how they feel. When babies start talking, they may say they're a girl, a boy, both, or neither.”
One lesson plan for third- to fifth-grade students, titled “Social Justice Acrostic Poems,” had students “share and explore issues they're passionate about through acrostic poetry.” The plan asked teachers to write a list of social justice causes that kids could support, including “Black Lives Matter, Respect All Languages, Animal Rights, Climate Change, Migration is Beautiful, LGBTQ Rights, Women's Rights, Water is Life, Disability Rights, Gun Control, and March for Our Lives.”
Students choose a theme, write a poem about it, and share it with their classmates.
One of the resources on the Welcoming School website states:Gender Support Checklist” ” aimed at non-binary and transgender students.
The checklist instructs educators to explore students' family lives to determine whether parents support their children's gender identity.
“Be sure to ask students about their family relationships,” the checklist read. “Some students may choose not to use pronouns at all, while others may use multiple pronouns.”
One resource for teachers is:“LGBTQ Terminology Definitions for Elementary School Students” It offers advice on how teachers should talk to students about LGBTQ language and terminology.
“Questioning LGBTQ terminology helps students understand differences and treat others with respect,” the curriculum states.
Words included include pansexual, queer, intersex and non-binary.
The announcement also listed the “Welcoming Schools” program as one of two programs the company supports.
“The Welcoming Schools program focuses on preventing and eliminating bullying, which often targets LGBTQ students,” the release said.
“We are committed to strengthening our efforts to make meaningful and sustainable change to help transform our communities,” said Kelly Charles, senior director of diversity, equity and inclusion at Home Depot. I said at the time.
The Home Deportes expressed a similar sentiment in its fiscal 2022 Environmental, Social and Governance (ESG) report.
When Fox News Digital reached out to Home Depot for comment, a spokesperson said the partnership will end in 2023.
“Because Home Depot discontinued its partnership with HRC last year, we are not the appropriate contact to comment on HRC's programs. Questions about HRC should be directed to HRC directly. In the past, we have funded two conferences to train educators on how to prevent bullying using the Human Rights Campaign's Welcoming Schools program.”
Fox News Digital reached out to HRC but did not immediately receive a response.
