Our young British public are growing up fast. Whether it’s watching my three-year-old niece manoeuvring her way through an iPad better than I can or listening to teenagers putting the world to rights, there’s no doubt that the youth of today are living in a fast-paced world and are hungry to experience it.
In terms of the internet, sex seems to be on a different playing field, with the advent of information sharing, porn and social media adding a whole new layer to the world of teenage sex and relationships. With this change comes real alarm that we are not providing sufficient guidance for our young people at a vulnerable time of their development.
My own recollections of sex education circa 1999 are hazy: the school nurse waving a strip of condoms in front of a room of giggling 14-year-old girls and then, three years later, a switched-on adviser from Brook coming to speak, sadly when the majority of girls there were having sex already. Otherwise it was a reliance on friends, older sisters, parents or the indispensable More magazine for the problem page and gawking over “position of the fortnight”.
Young people these days, however, have no problems accessing information about sex. And it’s unfair to say that sex education in the classroom hasn’t improved since my teens. The recent National Survey of Sexual Attitudes and Lifestyles demonstrated that sex education in schools, if done properly, has a significant and positive effect on young people’s sexual decision making, health and wellbeing. But what it also identifies, along with a number of other recent studies, is that we’re not doing it enough and we’re not doing it right.
The Office for National Statistics reports that teen conceptions are down but still at high rates compared with some of our European counterparts. Sexually transmitted infection rates remain significant. Young people’s perceptions of relationships and what constitutes consent are worryingly skewed and high proportions of young lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender people experience bullying, prejudice and a lack of education with severe consequences.
In the absence of satisfactory direction, of real concern is the information children are independently turning to in its place. Easy access to porn and the hyper-sexualised use of social media at this crucial stage of development has created a false sense of sexual normality for young people. This is at a huge cost to their wellbeing and personal growth. My feeling of frustration and sadness when encountering a young person in clinic who’s never heard of PEP/hepatitis B vaccinations or a girl in distress as she’s been told anal sex is “what everyone’s doing” is becoming a distressingly common occurrence and something that must be addressed.
Pressure is now on the government to make some well measured decisions regarding the wellbeing of our teens. The education select committee has just released its recommendations to make sex education – posed to be renamed relationships and sex education – to be mandatory in schools. The rename is to highlight a much-needed focus on consent, young people’s rights, sexual wellbeing and education about same-sex relationships.
What the committee has also highlighted is the need for adequately trained people to deliver this specialist teaching. However, financial cuts have meant the loss of many of these trained individuals at a huge detriment to our young population. The National PSHE CPD training scheme that enables teachers to confidently and appropriately deliver sex education had funding withdrawn in 2010. And with the 2013 handover of commissioning sexual health services to local authorities, subsequent cash cuts to sexual health and contraceptive clinics is reducing the potential for clinicians to provide guidance for other professionals, educational outreach and focused young people’s services.
For now, decisions regarding the future of sex education are eagerly awaited and people committed to this cause continue their work in educating and empowering these adolescents. In the UK we are fortunate to live in a society that prides itself on both education and freedom of sexual choice. The focus now is on maintaining these rights for our younger population and arming them with the knowledge they need to tackle what lies ahead. Life as a teenager is complicated enough, so let’s not sell them short.
Sex education in the UK is letting our teenagers down
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