School students dissatisfied with sex education in Victoria
Media Release, Thursday 23 February 2006
Victorian students are dissatisfied with the sex education offered at school but teachers believe it is adequate, according to a study by researchers at the University of Melbourne.
Professorial Fellow Roger Short, from the Faculty of Medicine, Dentistry and Health Sciences, supervised the study. He says it shows the inadequacy of sex education in Victoria. “Importantly, students said they did not want values imposed on them, such as the promotion of abstinence.”
The study involved in-depth interviews with 20 adolescent girls aged 16 – 19 years and 15 teachers. Ten of the adolescents were pregnant and intending to deliver, four were pregnant and seeking a termination and six were not pregnant but came from disadvantaged backgrounds and were seeking health advice.
Professor Short says the research adds to the current debate on the provision of counselling services to women regarding planned or unplanned pregnancies.
The students’ main criticism was that insufficient time was allocated to discussion of sex education which is not a curriculum priority.
The results showed there were great variations in how sex education is taught across Victoria. Some students reported having discussed the subjects in depth, while others were exposed to little or none at all.
The study revealed that sex education is taught under a range of subject headings Science, Physical Education and Health, or without a discrete topic allocation at all, such as one-off workshops.
The research was presented at the Australian Society for Psychological Obstetrics and Gynaecology (ASPOG) Annual Scientific Meeting Psychosocial Obstetrics and Gynaecology: Current Controversies, held in Melbourne late last year.
Author of the research and University of Melbourne medical student, Kim Xia, received the New Investigator Prize for best presentation at the conference.
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