Professionals’ Views on Delivering SRE & SRE’s Role in Pupil Well-being

1. Professionals’ Views on Delivering SRE& SRE’s Role in Pupil Well-being Pam Alldred Centre for Youth Work Studies Brunel University Pam.Alldred@Brunel.ac.uk Paper for Sex Ed Forum 6/3/08

2. SREPAR: a multi-perspectival study

3. 3 papers in one? • Teachers’ views from interviews with PSHE Coordinators • School nurses’ views from interviews & focus groups • Pupil well-being: the importance of SRE

4. Teachers • PSHE coordinators & ‘the poisoned chalice’ • ‘It’s so low on everyone’s agenda’ • ‘Everybody says it’s important, but you’re under pressure to fit everything else in, & PSHE, as non examined, gets squeezed’ • ‘getting it in the neck’ from form tutors, reluctant, anxious & lacking confidence – untrained • Low status in relation to NC subjects • Competition within PSHE • Perceived competition with the Achievement Agenda • Anxiety – delegation & compartmentalisation

5. Achievement Agenda • Dominant agenda for academic attainment • Privileges the mind & relegates the body • Devalues social & emotional development • Concern with the effective is compromising the affective (McNess et al 2003) • ‘That’s not why I came into teaching’

6. OBSTACLESstatus resources pressures

7. Raising the status of SRE • Successful strategies: • Timetable collapse • Team teaching • Joining with statutory Cit Ed • Declining combined Citizenship/PSHE Coordinator post • Emphasising benefit to attainment & behaviour

8. School Nurses’ Views • Not just the ‘Nit Nurse’ • Specifically trained to deliver SRE to young people – individually & in groups • Expertise under-valued by schools • Even if contributing 3 lessons, not consulted re. curriculum or assessment • Technical knowledge sometimes consulted by teachers, concerned that many teachers didn’t have this • Level of qualification & CPD • Clear about confidentiality & about roles & values

9. ‘What I’m interested in is: at the point they got pregnant, had they got all the information that they needed? Could they have prevented it had they wanted to? Whatever choice they make, as long as it’s an informed choice & they make it because it’s what they want to make, I’ve no problem with it. […]’ ‘I don’t just pick out the pregnancy bits. I think it’s equally important that they know how to protect themselves from sexually transmitted diseases. They get a lot of mixed messages & I want them to know there is somebody there that they can talk to, who won’t tell their parents & who will point them in the right direction. That it is confidential.’

10. ‘I want them to be able to say to their boyfriend who says “I’m not using a condom because they don't work, they split”, “If you use them properly they are very reliable”. I want them to be equipped with that information. I am there to give them the information, & they act on the information.’ But rejected a service evaluation by conception or teenage pregnancy rates: ‘I don't consider I’ve failed if a girl gets pregnant as long as she’s got pregnant because she knew where advice was & chose not to access it.’

11. Sexual subjecthood(Allen 2005) • Young people’s agency (active & productive social agents) • Young people’s sexual knowledge, desire & practice • Young people’s sense of themselves as sexual subjects (or children’s)

12. Agency is not sexualizing ‘Most of the children aren’t doing it (intercourse), but are made to feel it’s not normal if they’re not.’

15. Pupil Well-being ‘When YP receive the message from school that sexual activity is predominantly about danger, guilt & risk while elsewhere it is promoted as involving fun, pleasure & power, sexuality education’s warnings can appear didactic & boring’ (Allen 2005: 169) • Young people should be recognised as sexual subjects, with desires, fantasies, experiences (& perhaps with other people) • Nurses managed this more than teachers ‘cos • a) they had an information-giving role & didn’t expect to inculcate particular moral values, and • b) they were clear about who their client was & the confidentiality that they could therefore offer

16. Feminist analysis of gender roles benefits girls and boys – mediating performance expectations & identity investments & helping question peer, parental or societal norms (e.g. the sexual double standard costs boys & girls) • Being articulate & empowered regarding sexuality is a necessary basis for protecting ones’ sexual health & well-being • Sexualities education must challenge homophobia and present sexual orientation honestly for all pupils – as an educational & social justice matter, not only a pastoral one relevant to certain pupils only • All professionals working with young people should be trained & supported to confidently discuss sex & relationships

17. Implications for practice: • Cit Ed can help with knowledge of & access to sexual health services which remains a big block (due to both knowledge of & anxiety about) • SRE must be taught by teachers or external experts with specific training, who are confident, not embarrassed • Must be taught within positive, respectful relationships that model assertive not aggressive communication, open discussion of values, difference, safe discussion of feelings (teacher-pupil, and whole school) Rethink the task as: • empowering YP to achieve positive sexual lives, & to have agency & reflexivity in their ‘sexual careers’ • pleasure, desire, intimacy or relationship enhancing • being honest about the pleasures as well as risks of sex

18. Other themes • Critique of the TPS for narrowing SRE; for gender-neutral & value presumptions • Why the ‘achievement agenda’ is bad for SRE & for YP • Contradiction for schools of operating competitive hierarchies yet protecting YP from the psychological effects • Logic of competition infecting thinking about self or relationships • Relationship context for delivering SRE in schools Argue for • SRE for social justice, & critique of pastoral approach • Critical values education, not use of SRE for other policy ends • A frank, fearless, feminist, embodied sexualities education for all