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Addressing sexting in sexual health education classrooms is one way of supporting young people to become good sexual citizens and to emphasise respect and consent in their sexual practices and in their lives. While a fair amount of research has worked with youth to understand their motivations for sexting, less research has been conducted with in-service teachers to understand their perspectives, pedagogical approaches, and beliefs regarding young people and sexting. Set in this context, this paper discusses findings from interviews with Canadian teachers who were teaching a new Ontario Health and Physical Education curriculum that included discussions of sexting. Our findings suggest that many teachers are still engaging discourses of risk, shame and blame when they talk to their students about sexting. Likewise, longstanding gender norms and stereotypical sexual scripts are evident in the ways in which many teachers both understand and teach sexting. Some teachers, however, are engaging in more promising pedagogical practices that frame sexting as having a range of uses, outcomes, and purposes, painting a more holistic picture of young people's sexting landscapes. Findings from this paper may be useful for educators and policymakers creating sexting curriculum for young people in educational settings. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper explores relationships and sexuality education (RSE) in New Zealand secondary schools. After conducting a nationwide survey of teachers and producing a report on the challenges reported by RSE teachers, we began to develop a paper exploring the perennial issues faced by RSE teachers as they enact curriculum policy. Given that these issues endure, we considered how else we could approach the paper: in particular, what different questions could we ask of our data; and what alternative analytics offer potential for thinking in new ways about the perennial issues, and move us beyond telling the same old story? Asking these questions led us to Bacchi’s What’s the problem represented to be? (approach to policy analysis. Using data from our survey to focus our attention on key issues for teachers, we work with extracts from national government guidance for schools and teachers on RSE to apply this approach. Under five headings developed through the data analysis, we present five ‘provocations’ – or deliberately provocative proposals for the future of RSE in New Zealand. We hope the ideas in this paper may spark different ways of thinking about RSE policy and practice, with the ultimate aim of delivering meaningful and responsive RSE in secondary schools. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Recent years have witnessed growing acceptance of gender and sexuality diversity in Australia; yet, its inclusion in the school curriculum remains contentious. Despite evidence to the contrary, there is a commonly held belief that parents consider the inclusion of such topics inappropriate. In the light of this, this paper focuses on an analysis of three qualitative items from an Australian national survey of parents of children attending government-funded schools. Informed by the responses to these questions, we sought to better understand the concept of age-appropriateness present in the discourses deployed by a (minority) number of Australian parents who did not support gender and sexuality diversity-inclusivity in the curriculum. Thematic data analysis identified three key themes used by parents to warrant gender and sexuality diversity curriculum exclusion based on age inappropriateness: namely, inclusion is 'confusing'; children are too 'immature'; and children are too 'easily influenced'. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper reports on findings from a survey conducted within a larger collaborative project, working with primary school teachers and parents to normalise conversations about LGBTQ+ issues in four English primary schools. Survey data from 96 teachers and parents highlight different perspectives on the inclusion of LGBTQ+ issues. Existing research shows teachers are often reluctant to address such issues, signalling various concerns, including fear of a negative parental reaction. Using quantitative analysis of Likert items combined with a qualitative analysis of open-ended comments, the study shows differences in perceptions between teachers and parents, and among participating parents. The findings show teachers are willing to address LGBTQ+ issues within the primary school curriculum with support from the majority of parents. Parental opposition to teaching about LGBTQ+ issues appears to be associated with some parents’ religious views and limited engagement with members of the LGBTQ+ community. Parents’ concerns largely focused on notions of childhood innocence and perceptions of age-appropriateness for teaching about/engagement with LGBTQ+ issues. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

People with intellectual and developmental disabilities have the right to access appropriate and comprehensive sexuality and relationship education (SRE), but face a long history of exclusion from SRE in the USA due to myths about the sexuality of people with intellectual and developmental disabilities, biases against people with disabilities, and segregationist educational policies. Additionally, people with autism/autistic people are more likely to report having an LGBTQIA+ identity, and need comprehensive SRE content to become socially competent members of their communities. Teachers and other practitioners are often placed in the uncomfortable position of addressing many SRE topics while feeling unprepared, trying to stay aligned with educational policies, managing caregiver expectations, and providing scientifically accurate fact-based information in an increasingly politicised social climate. This paper provides recommendations on how to teach about LGBTQIA+ issues to students with intellectual and developmental disabilities including recommendations for modifying existing SRE curricula, identifying effective instructional strategies, and outlining a process for including LGBTQIA+ identities in SRE content. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Politically expedient approaches to difficult knowledge about sexual violence have included educational practices that create conditions for 'safe' spaces, such as announcing content in advance, trigger warnings and other pedagogical practices that make care allowable and smooth out the sharp edges of violence that can knowingly invoke trauma. This paper is about the power of curricular materials charged with violence in educational practices that cannot guarantee safety. I draw from feminist new materialisms to analyse the thing-ness of clothing in an art installation that was curated as a sexual violence prevention curriculum at my university. I consider the clothing as mattering as the substance of affect and thought. The starting point is that pedagogies of affectively charged encounters in education produce relations of danger and repair with important implications for victims' and survivors' knowledge, memory and trauma. The goal is to question the hope for pedagogical guarantees concerning difficult knowledge and understand what more precarity might mean for pedagogical responsibility in sexual assault curricula. The paper concludes by considering the curricular possibilities of difficult affective knowledge for a kind of queer healing and collective attention to sexual violence. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

While consent forms part of the Health, Wellbeing and Relationships strand of the New South Wales (NSW) Personal Development, Health and Physical Education (PDHPE) curriculum in Australia, it is not consistently or effectively delivered within schools. The recent e-campaign, Teach Us Consent in NSW, drew attention to the alarmingly high rates of sexual assault experienced by young women during their school years or shortly after. The campaign called for mandatory, inclusive and comprehensive consent education in schools. This paper presents research from a case study of an elite, same-sex, Catholic boys' school in NSW, Australia, examining the types of knowledge and attitudes young men and their PDHPE teachers had about sexual consent and the types of consent pedagogies mobilised. Semi-structured, in-depth interviews were conducted with the five male PDHPE teachers, and a focus group was conducted with five Year 11 male students (aged 16–17). The findings highlight that while participants recognised the importance of sexual consent in intimate relationships, consent pedagogies were grounded in individualising discourses of risk, responsibility and care, which rearticulated hegemonic gender norms. Findings from this study contribute to discussions of how schools approach consent education, and the limitations presented by outsourcing relationships and sex education. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

To gain an understanding of how students perceive the messages they receive in their K-12 school-based sex education (SBSE) courses, it is important to talk with students who have recently taken these courses. This paper explores the curricula, messaging and environments of sex education courses delivered in schools in Ohio through twenty in-depth interviews with undergraduate college students. Three main themes became apparent from the data: (1) sex negativity in the messages being communicated to students, (2) the unique experiences of LGB students, and (3) missing pieces in the curriculum that students must fill in on their own. SBSE was found to impact cultural norms concerning sex and sexuality which had an effect on students' interpersonal and intrapsychic sexual scripts. We discuss the implications of students' experiences for how policy and practice change, particularly in Ohio, can move towards ensuring that school-based sex education is more inclusive, sex positive and thorough for the next generation of students and beyond. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Prior publications on sexuality education experiences have often focused on cisgender students. Few have studied transgender students' experiences, particularly in East Asia, and none have addressed these issues in the Hong Kong Chinese context, where transgender human rights are a hotly debated issue, and injustice towards trans youth persists. Using the concepts of transprejudice and rights-based sexuality education, this paper identifies the non-inclusive and inclusive sexuality education experiences of Chinese transgender students as reported in data from qualitative interviews with eight trans students aged 16–20 years from secondary schools and a community college. We identified the following themes: 1) Left Out – being omitted and silenced; 2) Terrified and Distressed – being misgendered and misinformed; 3) Outraged – being pathologised and bullied; 4) Empowered: connecting trans-Inclusive and rights-based education; 5) Affirmed and Supported – engaging in trans-inclusive dialogue. The paper argues that rights-based gender diversity content needs to be included in the sexuality education curriculum to reduce transgender students' feelings of marginalisation. It also speaks to the need for advocacy for non-prejudiced and inclusive sexuality education in Hong Kong. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

School-based sex education has been a controversial issue in the province of Ontario, Canada. When an updated sex education curriculum was introduced by the provincial government in 2015, the media heavily covered negative reactions to the curriculum, and one distinct genre of reporting became modestly popular: the fact-checking article. These listicle-style articles presented and debunked common misunderstandings surrounding the curriculum and while they tried to appear as a neutral response to misinformation, fact-checking articles are no less value-laden than other responses to the curriculum. By examining two examples of these 'fact-checking' and 'myth-busting' articles published in The Toronto Star in 2015, I argue against the assumption that simply exposing the facts of a curriculum's content is enough to dispel the deep anxieties that surround sexual values in a pluralistic democracy like Canada. This paper instead suggests that the reassurance provided by fact-checking obscures the ways that conflict and uncertainty might present opportunities rather than obstacles to creating and sustaining inclusive comprehensive sex education. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Sex and sexuality curricula in the USA should acknowledge the structural conditions racialised young people navigate to make sense of their sexual experiences and more explicitly recognise the political power of gender and sexuality. This paper suggests educators use women of colour feminism and decolonial studies to offer a historicised approach to understanding and engaging with gender and sexuality. Such an approach acknowledges how European colonisation has constructed white middle-class masculinity, femininity and heterosexuality as normative and pathologises other forms of gender and sexuality expression. It encourages educators to address state investment in colonial hierarchies by foregrounding how national legislation and associated discourses support the institutionalised pathologisation of racialised sexuality. Using a feminist of colour and decolonial approach, the article examines how US national policy further disciplines racialised sexuality by employing discourses of 'anchor babies' to justify the passing of new laws. It draws on the author's experience as an educator of colour to show how historicising gender and sexuality can teach racialised students there is nothing pathological about their sexuality. A transformed sex and sexuality curriculum is proposed to teach students about the political power they wield, and what critical understanding and action they can achieve. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Relationships and sexual health education is an accepted part of the school curriculum to support adolescent development. In recent years, the nature of this education has expanded to include topics encompassing a social model of health (e.g. with a focus on gender roles). There has, however, been limited exploration of student views about the inclusion of these topics. This paper presents student feedback on South Australia's Relationships and Sexual Health Programme, a state-wide curriculum produced by the state's major sexual and reproductive health organisation. The findings are drawn from an annual survey conducted from 2006 to 2017, involving 29,533 secondary school students aged 12–16 years. Regression analyses were used to assess the relationship between the year the survey was conducted and student ratings of the programme ('good/excellent' vs 'poor/satisfactory') and, separately, the individual topics students' considered most important. There was a positive association between survey year and rating the programme as 'good/excellent' with regard to providing a 'safe and supportive classroom environment', and a small negative association between survey year and 'overall rating' as 'good/excellent'. Over time, there was an increase in the number of students selecting the topic 'consent' as the most important. These findings demonstrate student support for the inclusion of a range of social health topics in relationships and sexual health education. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

While educators, curriculum authors and policy makers alike are influenced by assumptions about parents' dis/approval of gender and sexuality diversity, both generally, as well as specifically in relation to this topic's appropriateness for K-12 classrooms, little empirical data is available to support these assumptions. What data does exist suggests that parents generally support the implementation of a comprehensive sexuality curriculum, inclusive of same-sex attraction, and view sexuality education as a school-parent partnership. Surveying a sample of Australian parents of children attending a government (public) school (N = 2093), whose responses were weighted to produce nationally representative estimates, this study sought to expand on previous findings by exploring the complexities of parents' attitudes in relation to gender and sexuality diversity and its place within relationships and sexual health education. This paper provides a descriptive overview of parents' ideas about the purpose of relationships and sexual health education and their views on the importance of including gender and sexuality diversity-inclusive content within related curriculum areas. Notably, over 80% of parents supported the inclusion of gender and sexuality diversity-inclusive relationships and sexual health education topics across primary and secondary government schools. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

People with an intellectual disability experience a protective regime when it comes to their sexuality. Families, carers, services and others mediate their experiences and act as gatekeepers through policies and practices that focus on the regulation and management of sexuality. Sex education has traditionally been 'for' people with intellectual disabilities provided 'by' health professionals, teachers and other professions who position themselves as experts with the power to shape the sex education, information and learning opportunities that people with an intellectual disability access. This paper presents an alternative programme developed in collaboration with people with intellectual disabilities, which uses the stories of people with an intellectual disability and is facilitated by people with intellectual disabilities as peer educators. Crip theory rejects approaches to understanding the disability experience that privilege particular characteristics of disability experience over others including cognition. This paper argues this idea can offer a 'way in' for people with intellectual disabilities to research, debate and progress sexual rights within the current sexual rights vacuum in international law and policy. The paper demonstrates how an Australian peer education programme provides a liberating sex education for those involved through a focus on rights and use of peer education. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper reports on findings from an integrative literature review of evaluation studies undertaken into sexual health promotion preparation programmes aimed at professionals with a sexual health promotion remit. Using a pre-defined search strategy, inclusion criteria and PRISMA guidelines, databases were systematically searched. Studies were screened and those included were quality assessed. Twenty-seven relevant studies were identified. Thematic analysis showed programmes were diverse in terms of how they had been developed, the content included, approaches to evaluation and outcomes identified. Evaluations showed participation in a training programme encouraged participants to feel more comfortable and confident to discuss sexual health within their role and more likely to introduce sexual health into client discussions. The types of programmes and evaluation approaches were diverse making direct comparison between them challenging. There should be agreed core outcome impact measures for sexual health education programmes in the areas of knowledge, comfort, skills and changes to practice, to allow for more direct comparison in future evaluation studies. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

It is well documented that the most effective sexuality education programmes employ a whole-school learning approach. More specifically, when schools and their leaders and teachers embrace such an approach, they view student learning in the context of the whole experience of being at school – from the classroom, to the home and the partnerships schools form with the local community. In parallel to this, people born with intersex variations report the lack of a systematic and broad approach to recognition and inclusion of intersex variations in schools due to strong 'normativity' messaging, including that pertaining to the body. Similarly, schools fail to engage mindfully with contemporary content that promotes a positive and diverse understanding of intersex in educational spaces, guidelines, policies and the curriculum. In line with community expectations outlined by the Darlington Intersex Community Consensus Statement, peer-led intersex rights-and-health-advocacy, and intersex-affirming scholarship, this paper advocates for and seeks to offer recommendations on how schools might enact a whole-school approach for sexuality education that is inclusive, affirming, visible and supportive in promoting and upholding the rights and health of students with intersex variations. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article examines the views of male and female learners regarding how Life Orientation (LO) sexuality education is taught at their schools. Learners in the study were selected from five former 'Black' schools in the Eastern and Western Cape Provinces of South Africa. Focus groups were used to identify what learners could recall about their LO sexuality education classes. The strong trend in the data speaks to how LO sexuality education implies a gendered, heteronormative and moralistic approach to youth sexuality which silences and negates same sex relationships and girls' accounts of sexuality. Although LO sexuality curricula are, as crafted on paper, often sophisticated learning programmes, participants point to a disjuncture between the official LO sexuality education curriculum and how LO sexuality education is taught in the studied schools. The paper concludes with some specific recommendations for teachers to promote a non-judgemental approach to sexuality education that challenges heteronormativity and other gendered injustices as part of the teaching of LO sexuality education. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Good quality teacher education and training has been acknowledged as an effective strategy to reduce sexual prejudice against sexual minority (lesbian, gay, bisexual and questioning/queer [LGBQ]) students. However, no mandated programmes have been developed to include LGBQ-related content in teacher training in Hong Kong, a Chinese society in which heterosexism prevails. Based on the concepts of sexual prejudice, minority stress and contact theory, this paper explores the international and regional literature on LGBQ students' school experiences, highlighting the significant role teachers play in supporting these students to transgress sexual prejudice, and presenting suggested themes and strategies for teacher training programmes, drawn from qualitative interviews with eleven Chinese teacher allies. Data analysis led to the identification of the following themes: 1) starting sexual diversity training officially; 2) reconsidering assumptions; 3) engaging with relevant cultural knowledge and skills; and 4) using dialogue as a training strategy. This paper argues that accurate content about sexual diversity should be incorporated into the professional teacher training curriculum, with updated sexuality concepts and prejudice-free, LGBQ-inclusive language relevant to the Chinese cultural context. Teachers need to become more aware of how sexual prejudice is manifested through cultural forces. Intergroup contact can be included as a useful training strategy. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper explores the use of withdrawal as a harm reduction approach to adolescent pregnancy prevention and its association with condom use. Data come from a baseline survey of a randomised controlled trial to test the effectiveness of FLASH, a sexual health education curriculum. Study participants completed electronic self-report surveys in health classes in their first or second year of high school (age range 14.1–17.9, mean 15.3 years). One-hundred and ninety-one students (12% of full sample) reported engaging in vaginal intercourse in the 3 months prior to the survey; of these, 66.0% reported using withdrawal as a birth control method, without significant differences by race, gender, region or birth control beliefs. Withdrawal was often used in combination with condoms (55.5%), periodic abstinence (40.0%) and birth control pills (13.4%). The effectiveness of withdrawal and its prevalence suggest an opportunity to reflect on how withdrawal is taught – moving from avoiding its use to a harm reduction approach to help sexually active youth avoid risk, reduce risk and reduce potential harm associated with sexual behaviours. Rather than focusing on withdrawal as risky, youth-serving professionals should acknowledge young people's efforts to prevent pregnancy and recognise the social and relational contexts of contraceptive choices. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Comprehensive sexuality education (CSE) is a key component of efforts to improve sexual and reproductive outcomes for young people. While many governments have established policies and curricula for CSE, there are no quantitative measures of the quality of their implementation in schools. We describe the construction of a school-level index to measure CSE implementation quality using data from Peru, Guatemala, Kenya and Ghana for validation. The composite index represents seven key components of a successful programme: range of topics, values imparted, teaching methods, teacher training, resources available, monitoring and evaluation, and the school environment. These components are combined into two sub-indices (curriculum content and implementation context), which together provide a summary index of implementation quality. We present scores for the seven components, the two sub-indices and the summary index for each country. Ghana scored highest on the summary index, while Guatemala scored lowest, but country rankings varied within the different components. The paper discusses the implications of the findings for improving school-based CSE in these countries. An assessment of the validity and reliability of the index indicates it can be used in other settings and could be a useful tool for educationalists, researchers and programme implementers to measure CSE implementation quality. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Sexuality education is a compulsory part of The New Zealand Curriculum for state-funded schools. In 2015, the Ministry of Education has published an updated revision of their official guidelines for schools on the teaching of sexuality education. This paper employs Foucauldian discourse analysis to argue that this policy document, Sexuality Education: A Guide for Principals, Boards of Trustees, and Teachers, reflects and reproduces particular ways of knowing which constrain possibilities for socially just sexuality education. These discourses include the adoption of an intellectual approach to teaching sexuality, the mandate to measure learning objectives, and a narrow emphasis on positive sexuality. Intentions for the curriculum to deliver a holistic, socio-ecological vision of sexual health as well as one which embeds Māori values are undermined by dominant understandings of individual action which shape approaches to both sexuality and pedagogy. Furthermore, the liberal recognition of cultural, ethnic, sexual and gender diversity in the curriculum unintentionally reinscribes an unmarked white, secular, heterosexuality as the norm. This paper reflexively critiques the discursive tensions that inhibit the realisation of sexuality education in schools which meets the needs of diverse students and offers it as a possible site for social justice. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Changing and challenging social norms is essential to preventing gendered violence, and education is widely regarded as a key means through which this can happen. Whilst good-quality research exploring the outcomes of such educational interventions exists, very little is known about what actually happens inside educational spaces aiming to instigate change. This gap limits understandings of how and why change does (or does not) happen. This paper aims to address this by providing an opportunity to peer into a ‘space for change’. To do this, observational data are analysed from a non-formal education programme aiming to empower girls to be free from violence in Kenya. Three moments are explored which illustrate ‘empowerment’, ‘subversion’ and ‘resistance’. The paper also explores the often hidden stories of the facilitators, showing that who teaches can be as important as the curriculum used in determining what happens inside educational spaces for change. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

Classrooms reflect and contribute to normative sex, gender and sexuality categories in school culture, rules and rituals. Texts, materials, curriculum and the discourse we employ as educators perpetuate the pervasiveness of these categories. This paper explores some of the less visible ways in which sex and gender categories are constructed in US English Language Arts (ELA) classrooms, and how institutionalised heteronormativity positions students within normative categories of sex, gender and sexuality. These limiting conversations are difficult to identify and even more difficult to challenge. But it is precisely this dynamic – the subconscious reinforcing of sex and gender binaries – that upholds the dominance of the institution of heterosexuality. Merely addressing lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, queer (LGBTQ) issues in the field of teaching reading, writing and literacy is an incomplete strategy. To disrupt normative narratives in the ELA classroom, educators must first identify the everyday practices occurring in school spaces, specifically recognising the teacher as a text. For sustained challenges to institutionalised norms, ELA teachers must engage in this work outside of LGBTQ-inclusive instructional materials and anti-homophobic education, and this paper offers specific methods for disrupting mainstream narratives in ELA classrooms. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

New York City (NYC) is considered to be one of the world’s most progressive cities and gender and sexuality diversity (GSD)-inclusive education departmental policies appear to reflect these values. However, even within such a context, NYC educators report challenges in their work to meet the needs of trans/gender-diverse students and the visibility of trans/gender diversity more generally within their pre-K - 12 school communities. This paper reports on interview data from 31 school staff members from nine public and independent schools located in the NYC metro region, with a specific focus on their framing of inclusivity and bullying, and reported support of trans/gender-diverse students. Based on educators’ representations of their schools, the nine schooling environments fell into two broad clusters: (1) those framing trans/gender inclusivity as an anti-bullying initiative and working at the minimum policy requirements, and (2) those working beyond bullying discourses and policy frameworks to conceptualise trans/gender inclusivity as integral to the school’s mission and as offering clear whole-community benefit. Findings support the constraints of bullying discourse on even supportive educators’ curricular ‘translation’ of GSD-inclusive policies, reinforcing the need for relevant policy reframing and targeted of professional development opportunities, particularly for school leaders. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper explores discourses of affirmative consent in sex education curriculum and policy. It traces the ways in which discourses of consent have emerged in sex education debates, focusing first on the activism of two young women in Ontario, Canada who lobbied the provincial government to include discussions of consent in a new Health and Physical Education (HPE) curriculum. Their activism is instructive for the ways in which their lobbying was eventually subsumed into the logics of curriculum, with learning outcomes and lesson plans taming the passion of their protest. As others see in sex education the answer to sexual violence, we cannot forget that sex education is, in part, a defence against passion, and that consent - once swallowed up by HPE - might also work to tame the unruliness of sexuality. Turning to age of consent laws - another arena where discourses of consent discipline the sexuality of young people - I ask how our pedagogical and legal address to sexuality paradoxically refuses its force. This is the central argument of this article - namely, that the concept of consent brings with it, into education, a procedural logic that misrecognises sexuality as a transparent, communicative, and rational experience and mistakes compliance for learning. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Critical Sexuality Studies is an emerging field of academic enquiry linked to an international network of advocacy agencies, activists, and political issues. This paper reports on the development of an advanced short course in sexuality theory and research, drawing on Critical Sexuality Studies and aiming directly at academics in developing countries working in sexuality issues. Over a three-year period, a new curriculum was developed by an international team. The course was piloted in two continents, refined, revised, and released globally under a Creative Commons licence in 2010 on a dedicated website. This paper documents the project and its progress to date. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Although social acceptance of gender and sexuality diversity is growing in Australian society, in schools, visibility and inclusion of knowledge pertaining to those who are gender- and/or sexuality-diverse, such as lesbians, gay men and transgender people, remain marginalised. This may be due, in part, to a belief that parents are opposed to such content inclusions in their children’s education; yet, virtually no Australian research supports this belief nor have parental perspectives on gender and sexuality diversity inclusion been specifically examined. This paper draws on a broader research study that examined New South Wales parents’ perceptions about the visibility of gender and sexuality diversity and the inclusion or exclusion of related content in school curriculum. It focuses on one particular focus group comprised of only mothers who lived in a specific enclave of Sydney known for its gender and sexuality diversity. The discussion highlights their awareness of gender and sexuality diversity and the dynamics surrounding it; and their perceptions of local school approaches to, and limitations around, gender and sexuality diversity in school curricula, policy and practices, despite potential support for it. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

While an overwhelming majority of people in the USA support some form of school-based sexual education, the specific content and context for that instruction varies widely, making it difficult to assess support for particular types of programmes. This is particularly the case for evangelical Christians, about whom there is a lack of scholarly consensus concerning support for sexual education. This paper addresses this gap, and examines the assumption that evangelical Christians uniformly support abstinence-only sexual education, using qualitative analysis among a group of evangelical Christians in a medium-sized Texas city. Respondents were asked during interviews to identify the types of sex education-related content they support, and where and how they believe these messages should be taught. Respondents were also asked to identify their rationales for supporting (or opposing) certain elements of sexual education. Interviews revealed a group of evangelical Christian parents who verbalised their explicit opposition to abstinence-based sex education in schools, lamenting the sex-negative messages they believe to be associated with it. It additionally became apparent that these parents believe that their opposition to abstinence-based sexual education aligns with a silent majority of evangelical Christians. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

At the foundation of most inequalities in expression of sexuality lie social constructions of gender. In this paper, sex education is considered as a possibility to challenge sexism and promote healthy and self-affirmative sex lives. In the past decade, the discourse of sex education in India has become a ‘battle of morality’ where concerned citizens condemn sex education on the grounds it may encourage sexual activity and immoral conduct (e.g. promiscuity or infidelity). The work of non-governmental organisations (NGOs) is an alternative to the governmental national curriculum plan. This paper discusses NGO potential in terms of sexual empowerment by examining beliefs and understanding, choices of information, strategies and methods, and approaches apparent in sex education programmes and projects. Through qualitative data, findings were analysed by constructing a sexual empowerment model that divides components of sex education into four parts and utilises theories of empowerment. The main findings include that all four components of sex education – foundation, content, strategies and approaches – show great potential to challenge gender inequalities in regard to sexuality. Sexual health programmes and projects are seen to be highly participatory, deliberative and encouraging of critical thinking. Some concerns are highlighted: the strong focus on girls as the main actors of change, and external limitations such as parents and institutions. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

In the midst of a generalised HIV and AIDS epidemic in southern Africa, the argument for more coordinated and comprehensive youth sexual health interventions is intensifying. Yet the crucial question of how best to provide young people with these skills and knowledge remains a key challenge for policy-makers, researchers and practitioners in our region. Moreover, amongst the available literature on sex education in southern Africa, few authors have taken an applied perspective, to look at fresh approaches and tools with the potential to be implemented more broadly. This paper argues for a greater focus on concepts of masculinity and sexuality in the development of sexual health efforts in southern Africa. It aims to bridge theory and practice by advancing six promising approaches with the potential to create a suitable space and environment for participants to engage with these issues. Approaches include methods and tools currently being implemented in existing programmes, as well as ideas emerging from recent literature. Our paper is ultimately a call for further ‘out-of-the-box’ thinking to find more effective and creative practical ways of providing the sexual health education our region's youth urgently needs. It is also a call for more applied research, to better inform future sex education programmes in southern Africa. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

In 2001, the Greek Government introduced sex and gender relationships education as a thematic unit for interdisciplinary Health Education activities. However, the diffusion of such programmes remains extremely limited. The present paper discusses how sex and relationships issues are presented in contemporary Greek primary school textbooks since textbooks play a central role in teaching and learning processes. It has been found that textbook references on a particular topic encourage teachers to select this topic for developing and implementing Health Education projects. In this paper the recent educational reform is presented, as well as the general guidelines for the development of the National Curriculum and Health Education Subject Curriculum, the contents of which determined the guidelines for the development of the new primary textbooks. Within this framework, the article discusses how sex education issues are being represented in primary 'Environmental Studies'/'Science' and 'Mother Tongue'/'Literature' textbooks. Findings support the claim that such representation is limited and single-dimensional, placing sex education at the margins of educational interventions in Greece at the moment. The marginalization of sex education, as it is argued, can be regarded as the effect of conflicting societal values. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The intention of this paper is two‐fold. First, it makes explicit a little known and poorly understood area of human experience: transgender. Second, it explores curriculum possibilities opened up by recent legitimating of transgender people through the Gender Recognition Act (2004). The Act foregrounds the necessity for a forum in schools to debate, reflect and understand the full implications of changes to legislation. This paper proposes that, rather than approaching transgender issues through biological science or through the levelling gaze of citizenship, issues of gender identity can be understood without censure through the visual arts. Moreover, the visual arts offer a ‘safe place’ to discuss issues around the body because they allow distance and, in offering visual representations rather than text‐based work, make visually concrete what science ethically cannot. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Danger and pleasure are terms commonly employed to describe women's sexual experiences, including those of young women. This paper explores how young women's sexual danger and pleasure are represented and characterized in official discourses, specifically those of school‐based sexuality education. Drawing on Michelle Fine's four major discourses of sexuality education, this paper uses the Ontario Curriculum and its companion Course Profiles to analyze school‐based sexuality education in Ontario, Canada. This paper describes how the discourses of victimization and individual morality dominate in the curriculum while the discourse of desire is largely absent. Because there is considerable emphasis on danger/victimization and insufficient attention paid to pleasure/desire, the paper concludes by describing how a discourse of desire might be included in sexuality education curriculum. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Numerous classroom-based interventions have aimed to improve sexual health outcomes for young people, yet few have shown strong, lasting effects. Ecological approaches that address multiple levels of a young person’s environment offer largely untapped potential to positively change sexual behaviour. This paper presents results of a cluster-randomised trial of a multicomponent sexuality education intervention that integrated a classroom curriculum, parent education workshops and materials, peer advocate programme, and sexual health services at 10 urban high schools. An implementation evaluation, employing quantitative and qualitative instruments, was conducted to examine whether the individual components of the intervention were delivered as planned and how they were received by the target populations. Multilevel modelling was used to evaluate the effect of the multicomponent intervention on outcomes at one-year follow-up. Results showed that the intervention components were successfully implemented with and well received by target populations. Students receiving the multicomponent intervention reported greater increases in the use of sexual health services (odds ratio [OR] = 1.73, 95% CI = 1.09–2.75) and the likelihood of carrying a condom (OR = 2.71, 95% CI = 1.44–5.09) relative to those receiving a control condition. No effects were found for other behaviours, possibly due to low prevalence of sexual activity in the sample and the small number of schools randomised. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

Portugal, like many other countries, faces obstacles regarding school-based sexuality education. This paper explores Portuguese schools’ approaches to implementing sexuality education at a local level, and provides a critical analysis of potential strengths and weaknesses. Documents related to sexuality education in a convenience sample of 89 schools were analysed and findings confirm both the results of the few existing Portuguese studies on the subject and commonalities in sexuality education between Portugal and other European countries. These include strengths, such as the existence of teams in charge of sexuality education in schools and the provision of resources, but also weaknesses, such as too heavy a focus on health-related issues, difficulties in cross-curricular teaching, low levels of community participation and poor-quality evaluation. Findings point to the need for a greater sharing of information and good practice between countries, and the need for clearer guidelines. Suggestions are made for improving the quality of sexuality education in Portuguese schools. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

A Family Life Education (FLE) curriculum was introduced in Fiji schools in 2010 in response to concern about increasing teenage pregnancies and young people's vulnerability to sexually transmitted infections and other health and social problems. However, conservative and suspicious parental attitudes towards FLE have been an obstacle. The need for an educational programme for parents to complement the FLE curriculum taught in schools is now urgent. This study examines parents' views on the sex and sexuality component of the FLE curriculum. Data were collected from 474 individuals using questionnaires, focus groups and face-to-face interviews. Participants represented different ethnic groups with Indigenous Fijians, women and Christians in the majority. The influence of the Christian religion on negative attitudes towards homosexuality and the use of protection is strong, as is parents' resistance to discussing sex education with their children. The paper concludes with suggestions on how to counter parents’ resistance to what they negatively perceive as Western or unbiblical ideas. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

Sexuality education forms part of the national school curricula of most sub-Saharan African countries, yet risk-related sexual behaviour among young people continues to fuel the HIV pandemic in this part of the world. One of the arguments put forward to explain why sexuality education seems to have had little impact on sexual risk-taking is that existing curricula have neglected to take into account the complexity of the social, cultural and gender norms that influence the behaviour of school-going young people in sub-Saharan Africa. Over the past few years, the Department of Basic Education in South Africa has recognised the need to provide guidance to teachers on the content, pedagogical processes and messages that are relevant to their specific context. This paper critically reflects on findings from a literature-based study conducted to identify the cognitive and social factors influencing the behaviour of school-going young people in South Africa and the risk and protective factors that might be particular to their circumstances. The findings provide helpful guidelines about the development, content and implementation of sexuality education curricula more likely to be relevant in contexts of serious poverty and disadvantage. Although based on the South African literature, the findings may also offer useful lessons for curriculum designers in other developing countries. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Research with lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgendered, queer, questioning (LGBTQ) and genderqueer (GQ) students has highlighted the links between school-based marginalisation and decreased school outcomes. This paper applies stage–environment fit theory to an investigation of school ‘gender climate’, the official and unofficial policing of gender expression by school staff and students, to explore what role gender climate plays in the above relationship. Three school life components associated with stage–environment fit theory – (1) the organisational, (2) the instructional and (3) the interpersonal – were used to scaffold interview data on school gender climate from five LGBTQ Australian young people. Results implicate school staff in the maintenance of gender climate and highlight the deleterious impact of school silences on related subject matter. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

The development of health promotion is typically viewed as a reaction against both the excessive responsibility placed on individuals concerning their health-related choices and the absence of recognition of environmental factors associated with personal decision making. What though does sexuality education mean from the perspective of health promotion? According to one approach, it implies the existence of a curriculum that recognises the environmental factors affecting sexuality and sexual behaviour. It also suggests a curriculum that aims to empower students to engage with risky sexual behaviour, not just as a personal issue but also as a social matter. The emphasis is placed not merely on developing personal knowledge and skills associated with sexuality and sexual behaviour but on enabling active citizens to protect themselves and their co-citizens from sexual risks and to promote healthy sexuality. This paper discusses such a health promotion perspective in relation to the sexuality education curriculum as recently developed in Cyprus. It demonstrates how a health promotion perspective in relation to sex education can be translated into the establishment of learning objectives, appropriate pedagogic methods and the development of school materials. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Heterosexism and heteronormativity are pervasive in the South African society, but to what degree are they present in Life Orientation (LO) textbooks? This question, explored through a content analysis of widely used Grade 10 LO textbooks, was framed by queer theory. The paper quantitatively examines the coverage of sexualities, and qualitatively examines how sexualities are constructed and projected in the texts. The quantitative analysis reveals a low percentage of statements devoted to sexuality overall and the normalisation of heterosexuality mainly through the exclusion of lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender (LGBT) sexualities but also through techniques of differentiation, hierarchisation and homogenisation. The qualitative analysis reveals inadequate information about sexualities and in its place a simplistic, moralistic ideological approach. Furthermore, discussions of the family, dating, safe sex and marriage assume heterosexuality as the norm. Nineteen years after the democratisation of South Africa and 17 years after the ratification of South Africa's constitution which explicitly forbids discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation, LGBT sexualities are largely invisible in school LO curricula. Since this is a subject that is compulsory for all learners and its express aim is to prepare young South Africans for participation as citizens in a just and democratic society, the absence of LGBT issues and identities helps perpetuate prejudice and violence towards LGBT communities. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Comprehensive sexuality education (CSE) has been recognised globally as key to helping young people assert their sexual and reproductive rights. In India too, there is growing awareness of the importance of providing CSE not only to reduce sexually transmitted infections, unintended pregnancies and abortions but also to teach important life skills. Simultaneously, lack of political will and conflicting interests among certain religious and political factions have ensured that no uniform CSE curriculum has been implemented throughout the country. This paper analyses the Adolescent Education Programme teacher curriculum as revised in 2009–2010 by the National Council of Educational Research and Training and the United Nations Population Fund. It highlights some of the opportunities presented by the curriculum and argues that despite its intent of providing relevant sexuality education for young people, the language of the curriculum is vague, thus potentially exacerbating confusion, and excluding people who do not conform to societal stereotypes of sex, gender, and ability. In order to be holistic, any CSE programme must be inclusive, cater to diverse needs and present content in a rights-based language without adding to the socio-cultural context of mystery and shame attached to sexuality. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper describes the process involved in creating a community-based training curriculum designed to build capacity and foster new knowledge in support of HIV/AIDS education. Highlighted are the challenges and triumphs incurred while working with community and academic partners to ensure the production of an adaptable curriculum designed to accommodate diverse teaching and learning styles. The curriculum provides teachers, community leaders and peer educators with knowledge and skills to competently deliver HIV/AIDS information, regardless of previous training in sexual health education. Educators are encouraged to adapt the curriculum according to community/classroom needs. Also highlighted is the need for creating further opportunities that enable teachers, community practitioners and researchers to collaborate around issues that influence learners' lives. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Historical studies have shown that, since its beginnings, sex education in England has mostly focused on ‘damage limitation’, emphasising only the dangerous inevitability of pregnancy and childbirth after unprotected sex and the hazards of sexually transmitted diseases. This approach is largely based on restrictive notions of teenage sexuality, characterising teenagers as hypersexual beings for whom sexual drives continuously threaten to produce unwanted babies unless preventive action is taken. Analysis of current materials from many curricular areas reveals that this is still the case. Yet, recent demographic evidence shows that educated women in Europe continue to delay first childbirth for a number of reasons. At the same time they are also subject to seductive and deceptive media messages about the possibilities of conception at late reproductive age through reporting on ‘older’ celebrity mothers, and the role that reproductive technologies play in conquering infertility. In the light of these demographic trends, and the misleading hidden curriculum, this paper contends that discourses of damage limitation are no longer appropriate in sex education. Instead, if educated women are to gain full reproductive autonomy then new, more balanced conceptualisations of sex education that also incorporate appropriate messages about the finite nature of the reproductive lifespan are needed. Not only will this help schools provide comprehensive, quality, progressive sex education, it will also ultimately contribute to future national health and well-being. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

Within Europe, there are few greater disparities in national sexuality education reputation and discourses than between those of Ireland and Sweden. Sweden introduced a school-based model in 1933 and is often hailed as a ‘global leader’, while Ireland's 1994 introduction of relationships and sexuality education could classify it as a ‘late bloomer’. Sweden's social democratic state and reputation of sexual liberalism contrast sharply with the Republic of Ireland's post-colonial nationalism, historically linked to the Catholic Church. Ireland's continued lack of provision for safe and legal abortion services juxtaposes against Sweden's historical role in the eugenics movement. Dissecting sociopolitical milieux from the perspective of those working in sexuality education proves useful for facilitating new insights. Using queer-feminist methodologies, sexuality education professionals in Ireland (n = 17) and Sweden (n = 17) were interviewed, followed by an examination of their narratives. This paper aims to illuminate how and why certain discourses emerge, why others are blocked and to theorise hidden intricacies as well as wider movements which may be underway. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

While there is little political opposition towards sex education as such in Norway, recent attempts at reforming the subject reveal underlying heteronormative presumptions that seem resistant to reform. While a focus on homosexuality is included in the national curriculum at all levels of compulsory education, the sexual practices involved in same-sex relations remain conspicuously absent from the education provided. This paper provides an overview of contemporary Norwegian sex education, and discusses its primary shortcoming: the absence of a focus on sex acts other than coitus. The political challenges to good sex education in Norway emerge when this absence of sex acts is addressed by innovative teaching programmes that focus on sexual pleasure. Norwegian political consensus about a free and equal sexual culture does not seem able to embrace the discussion of specific sexual practices in the classroom. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper examines the recent controversies surrounding the decision to introduce sex education in secondary schools in India to combat the rapid spread of HIV and AIDS in the country. While 11 Indian states have banned it, the Left-ruled state of West Bengal has designed a teachers' manual to impart sex education. However, a close analysis of this material shows that it suffers from the same anxieties about ‘western licentiousness’ that will affect ‘pure’ Indian youth and delivers the same message of sexual abstinence that characterizes the arguments deployed against the teaching of sex education. Both the proponents and opponents of sex education see sex education as a part of a larger programme of globalization that is threatening Indian culture and needs to be resisted either by rejecting the programme or by using it to construct a sexually abstinent nationalist youth force. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

Sexuality policy is currently changing at global, national and local levels. This move is affecting the sexuality education discourses in education policies around the world. However, the changes are not always translating into a direct re-thinking of approaches, and in some cases result in a push for more conservative policy. This paper provides a discourse exemplar for understanding the broad range of sexuality education discourses currently at work in education policies and policy movements internationally. It is intended for use in sexuality education policy research, conception and practice. The different constructions of ‘the child’ at the core of the various discourses are examined, including the ways in which the different discourses attempt to ‘save’ these children from perceived sexuality problems through education. The article posits that such rhetorical children should not ‘stand in’ for the needs of actual children in sexuality policy, without being explicitly acknowledged as constructs. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

In this paper, it is argued that sexuality education for individuals with intellectual disabilities has historically been incomplete to non-existent. While some progress has been made in this area, individuals with intellectual disabilities continue to receive inadequate sexuality education due to its failure to address the 'ignored curriculum'. The ignored curriculum is defined as the curriculum learned incidentally outside the classroom through peer interactions - interactions from which students with intellectual disabilities are often precluded. Here, comprehensive sexuality education that addresses the ignored curriculum is linked to a person's ability to exercise full rights of citizenship. An argument is made for a critical pedagogical approach to sexuality education as an effective means to teach individuals with intellectual disabilities the ignored curriculum of sexuality. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper reports on a study that examines how a group of teachers at a Victorian Islamic College deliberated on how to develop an appropriate sexual health education curriculum for their Muslim students. Teachers found themselves challenged by the current restrictive curriculum structures, policies and practices at their school. They also found themselves struggling with embedded student cultural understandings and traditions of sexual health that contradict Islamic teachings as stated in the Qur'an and Hadith. In contemplating the possibilities of a sexual health curriculum from an Islamic perspective, teachers desired to confront longstanding political issues and hegemonic structures at their school to enable the search for a solution to a curriculum problem and construct the conditions necessary for its sustainability. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Sexuality education for school-aged young people is a crucial component of all quality education systems. It prepares young people for participation in society as responsible, mature and community-minded citizens. Most contemporary school education curricula generally aim to enhance young people's knowledge, skills and understandings of the world, and of their rights as human beings and citizens of nations. The current sexuality problems of many young people are the opposite of these; namely, ignorance, lack of skills, misunderstandings, and loss of rights, as well as unnecessary fear and shame about themselves and others. Many young people do not receive any sexuality education at all, and frequently parents have been found to be unsatisfactory providers of sexuality education for their offspring. Schools, then, become the logical place to provide this. Nowadays, the earlier maturing of girls and boys provides a further persuasive argument for quality sexuality education in all schools. The absence or erosion of school-based sexuality education through ignorance, fear or unreasoned response helps support ignorance about sexual behaviours, increased rates of unwanted pregnancy, sexually transmitted infections, and the cruel loss of life opportunities for young people. The present paper responds to 12 parental objections to school sexuality education, by providing research facts and evidence-based reasoned arguments to them. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]