The Ministry of Education has removed the relationship and sexuality teaching guidelines, a move that Sexual Wellness New Zealand is concerned about and has been labelled “a big step backwards.
The move answered a coalition agreement with New Zealand First. Winston Peters had referred to them as “woke out-of-touch guidelines”.
In a recent review, 85% of school leaders told the Education Review Office (ERO) that the sex ed guidelines were helpful.
“I think that removing the guidelines does take away the support for any new teachers that are involved in the health education or creating the programmes that we need to do with our students,” Haeata Community Campus health teacher Carolyn Leeson said.
The guidelines contain information about “consensual, healthy and respectful relationships being essential to student well-being” as well as guidance on how to navigate pornography, cyberbullying, social media, gender identities and sexualities.
Sexual Wellbeing Aotearoa Director of Health Promotion Fiona McNamara has called on the Ministry of Education to provide more guidance to schools, with the new health and physical education curriculum not currently available.
“A lot of schools are just deciding to put a hold on teaching relationships and sexuality education at the moment because they just don’t know what’s going on and they don’t want to get it wrong,” McNamara said.
“It’s a huge issue. It just means that there are young people who are going to miss out on this education.”
However, Education Minister Erica Stanford said schools should continue to use the 2007 curriculum until the new ones are made available later this year.
Photo Credit: RNZ
