essay on sex education in simple language

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Simple & Easy Sex Education Essay Titles

• The Other Side: the Importance of Sex Education in High School
• The Ongoing Debate Over Sex Education and Its Influence on Our Children
• Why Sex Education for Children Is Very Important
• The Importance of Sex Education in Today’s Schools
• The Religious and Cultural Aspect of Sex Education
• Single Sex Education Are Becoming More Complicated Countries
• Why There Should Be Comprehensive Sex Education in Schools
• The Reasons Why Sex Education Will Help Reduce Teen Pregnancy
• The Importance and Need for Sex Education to Deal with Teenage Pregnancy
• What Sex Education Topics Are Most Effective in Elementary Schools
• Gender Discrimination for Single Sex Education
• How Sex Education Can Change Teenage Sexual Behaviour
• Why Teens Need Comprehensive Sex Education

Good Essay Topics on Sex Education

• The Importance of Sex Education in America and to American Teenagers
• The Main Features of Sex Education in Traditional Societies and Its Importance
• The Effects of State‐Mandated Abstinence‐Based Sex Education on Teen Health Outcomes
• Why Sex Education Should Be Taught in Schools
• The Issue of Teaching Sex Education in Public Schools
• The Importance of Teaching Sex Education and Homosexuality
• The Three Forms of Sex Education in the United States
• The Inclusion of Sex Education in the School Curriculum
• When Values Clash with Faith: Sex Education in Religious Based Schools”
• What Are the Pros and Cons of Sex Education in Hong Kong Secondary Schools
• Should Sex Education Be Increased in Schools to Curb Problems in Society?
• The Impact of Single Sex Education on Girl ‘S Academic Performance
• The Need for a Comprehensive Sex Education in American Schools
• The Benefits of Sex Education in Public Schools
• Why High schools Should Have Sex Education Starting Freshman Year

Research Questions About Sex Education

• What Age Should Sex Education Be Taught?
• How Should Sex Education Be Taught?
• What Are the Pros and Cons of Sex Education in Hong Kong Secondary Schools?
• Can Single-Sex Education Improve Students’ Academic Achievement in Middle School?
• What Sex Education Topics Are Most Effective in Elementary Schools?
• Has the Media and School-Based Sex Education Reduced the Prevalence of Sexually Transmitted Diseases?
• Why Should High schools Have Sex Education Starting Freshman Year?
• Does Sex Education Influence Sexual and Reproductive Behaviour of Women?
• Why Is Same-Sex School Education Better?
• How Far Should Schools Teach Sex Education?
• Why Is Sex Education for Children Very Important?
• Does Sex Education Work?
• Why Should Sex Education Be Taught in Schools?
• How Can Sex Education Change Teenage Sexual Behaviour?
• Why Do Teens Need Comprehensive Sex Education?
• Will You Choose CoEd or Single-Sex Education?
• Our Current Sex Education, Why Doesn’t It Work?
• Demand for Sexual Services in Britain: Does Sex Education Matter?
• Co-Education and Single-Sex Education: Which Will Benefit Children More?
• Why Do Teens Need Sex Education?
• When Values Clash with Faith: Sex Education in Religious Based Schools?
• Should LGBT History Be Taught in Schools?
• Which City or Country Has Sexual Education for Parents of Children with Autism Spectrum Disorder?
• How to Educate the 4th-6th Elementary Student About Sex?
• How Successful Is Abstinence-Only Sex Education in Reduce Teen Pregnancy?
• Is Introduction Sex Education in Schools Useful?
• Does the School Provide Enough Information on Sex Education?

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The Importance of Sexual Education Essay

Personal sexuality.

Sexual education has an integral role in removing one’s doubts on sexuality and sex related topics. It has often been identified that sexual education helps one to get a clear picture of the male and female sexuality. The sexual counseling and orientation class that I received was really effective in taking away the veil of sexual illiteracy and it enabled me to understand what human sexuality is. Regarding my personal experience with the class, I can identify it as one of the most effective classes which I ever attended and it helped me in changing my concepts about sex. As it was a class that covered almost all the sections of sexuality, the participants got the opportunity in properly identifying and clarifying their doubts on this topic. It was effective to get a clear picture of sexually-transmitted diseases and their evil effects on mankind. The proposed paper is an attempt to explore what sexuality is and the misconceptions of individuals about sexuality, based on personal experience of attending an orientation class on sexuality.

Researchers show their willingness to reach the conclusion that misconceptions and vague beliefs about sexuality contribute severe physical and mental disorder and behavioral problems. Various studies prove that effective orientation courses and sex education programs help to solve sexual problems and permit a person to mould a desired outcome in a person’s sexual life. The course promotes enormous knowledge and scientific information about sexuality in adolescence. In case of an adolescent, physical and mental changes affect seriously. In case of a male, biological changes such as puberty, growth of sexual organs and sexual attractions towards opposite sex are very common. In my own personal opinion the orientation course helped me to create scientific notions about sexual difficulties and sex-related diseases. The course helped me to deal sex as something serious and responsible phenomena in a person’s life. The web article entitled Sexual Difficulties remarks that; “Sexual difficulties belong to the group of conditions known as psychosomatic disorders, in which the body expresses the distress via a symptom, such as low libido.” ( Sexual Difficulties, p. 1).

Adolescent period is the most crucial time in a person’s life and the detailed description by the course person gives new knowledge about the behavioral changes and disorder problems. Both male and female suffer from lack of love, consideration, respect and proper interaction. Like other people, I also have some vague concepts about sexual changes and psychological impacts on a person’s life. After the orientation course I could understand more about male and female anatomy and their psychological impacts. Through the course I have got an opportunity to comprehend the term gender problem. Effective interaction between the course person and the listeners reduced the complications of the topic and it enabled me to admit sex is not only a means of enjoyment and merrymaking but a vital part of the process of human growth.

Like any other student, I was also not an exception and I had kept a false illusion over sexuality. One of the prominent lessons that I learned during the classes was about the gender issues. As I am one of the members of the male chauvinist society, I had formed my concept of sexuality with male possessing dominance. These classes planted in me the seeds that sexuality is a positive and healthy experience in which man and woman have equal roles. It was the class that cultivated in me the due respect to my opposite sex and I began to regard them equal to me. Understanding of female and male sexual anatomy and physiology helped realizing the genital change and growth in male and female. The transitional period of male and female from adolescence to youthhood is always problematic to children that their ignorance often leads them to mental and physical disorders. Some of the studies have identified children becoming depressed caused with the lack of sexual education. But it is possible for one to say that sexual education is always effective. The words of Dr. D Kirby, et al. make clear this fact when they rightly comment thus, “…there can also be many negative consequences of adolescent sexual behavior.”(Kirby, et al ). Now I am capable of recognizing the real physiological problems of children. I have also understood the ill-effects of prostitution and sexually transmitted diseases.

The course which I attended says how the relationship between partners can make a stronger one. They are of the opinion that if the partners build up a good communication with each other along with a good sexual relationship they can lead their life happily. While going through this class I realized that it is only by making a deep communication I can make my family relationship an ardent one. In the relationship with my partner I find some dissatisfaction because we are not always sharing our likes and dislikes. I think it is because of this there is a great gap between us. Now there is no good relationship between us because there is no deep communication between us. But after attending this class I understood about the relationship between the male and female sexual anatomy and how deep love and communication can help to make a good relation with my partner. I also got a good idea about sexually-transmitted diseases and what all difficulties will be there in the sexual relationship and by hearing the solutions I tried to change my attitudes toward my partner. Earlier I was not concerned about my partner’s wish or difficulties but now I care my partner and I try to understand the difficulties which my partner faces and in the coming days I will take care to make our relationship a success. I understood from the class that if there is a true love between partners and if they try to understand each other one can make their life a fruitful one.

The course gave a lot of valuable information about how to lead a happy and peaceful married life and what are the ways to attain such perfection. The course mainly focused on to have an understanding about the good and bad effects of keeping a sexual relation. The course gave comfortable contents which every one can put into practice. First of all the good content I consider is keeping a deep love and communication between the partners. This information is enough to lead a happy life, because if these two are put into practice there will be no clash and quarrel between the partners in sexual matter. For instance if one does not reveal his or her dissatisfaction about the manner of the partner in sexual relation, it will make a silent pain in the mind of the dissatisfied person and this will lead the person to be in a great hatred to his or her partner and thereby the relation too. So there should be a healthy communication and a kind of ardent love between the partners to avoid such hatred and other similar situations. The other comfortable content I found in the course is the description and discussion of male and female anatomy and physiology as it helps both the partners to understand every likes and dislikes of the other and can mingle with the other in an appropriate way. The discussion about sexual difficulties and solutions are also comfortable as it is highly favorable to know the causes of such difficulties and also the methods to solve those problems. The most important content I found in the course is the discussion about sexually transmitted diseases as it will create awareness among the people who keep different relations. So it will play a crucial role to change such attitudes and thereby the relation. These are the comfortable contents that I found in the course and are valuable to lead a better life.

Male and female anatomy and physiological features constituted more important knowledge for me. Each male and female has his/her own physical and genetic features. Comparing the physical changes of female in adulthood, female development is too fast and noticeable. I think one of the most valuable one is that the course provided proper awareness about inevitable relationship between physical growth and psychological changes. The given information helped me to know more about the structure of both male and female physical organs, especially the various changes of genital organs and their biological functions. The knowledge about opposite sex enabled me to respect persons from opposite sex. Childhood sexuality and its significance in development process were highly thought-provoking areas of the discussion. Genetic abnormalities and various sexual diseases are not familiar topics for me. Jane Coad and Melvyn Dunstall write “There are genetic conditions that result in a range of variable sexual development, such as Klinefelter’s syndrome and Turner’s syndrome.” (Coad, and Dunstall, p. 100). The course and orientation programs were helpful to number of people who have only some vague knowledge about personal sexuality.

To conclude, one can infer that there should be attempts to educate children on sexuality and the human body. From my personal experience of attending the class on sexuality, I have understood the importance of sexual education as it helps students to understand persons of their opposite sex. Proper understanding of male and female anatomy and physiological features is important in one’s life. Attending such classes remind one about the significance of a healthy sexual relation and its role in promoting better life situations. Scientific information about sexuality and the transition in the adolescent period also assumes significance. Male biological changes such as, puberty, growth of sexual organs and their sexual attraction to their opposite sex are quite common and if one is totally ignorant of these facts he/she may face some mental stress or in some cases it may lead to mental depression. Regarding sexual relation in married life, one can see that sex and sexual satisfaction have integral roles. Failure in understanding his/her pair in sexual relationship often leads to the ruin of family relationships. So, one is sure of the fact that sexual education has an elite role in one’s life. Proper sexual education should be given to children to avoid sexual illiteracy and sexual crimes.

Works Cited

• Coad, Jane., and Dunstall, Melvyn. Anatomy and Physiology for Midwives . Elsevier Health Science. 2001. Web.
• Kirby, Douglas., etal. School- Based Program to Reduce Sexual Risk Behaviors: a Review of Effectiveness . Public Health Report, 109. 3(1994): 339-360. Pub Med Central Journal List. 2009.Web.
• Sexual Difficulties. Andrology Australia.2006.
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The Role of Education in Preventing Sexual Misconduct

Three ideas for improving sex education to create a culture of consent and help prevent sexual misconduct.

As a consultant and researcher on sexuality and misconduct, I know that preventing sexual misconduct starts with education that shifts the paradigms and norms we have about sex, relationships, and bodily autonomy.

Adulthood is not the best time to start these conversations—by then, our culture and media have already sent millions of messages in the wrong direction. And making sex and sexuality the enemy is the least effective approach. Research shows that the more we talk about sex and agency in the late childhood and teen years, the less likely it is that abusive dynamics will arise—and, if they do, the more likely that self-efficacy and personal advocacy will be present.

As educators, it’s our goal and responsibility to nurture the whole student. Excluding consent and sexual agency from our educational objectives has long-lasting, tragic implications—ones we see, for example, in the scandal that has hit Chicago Public Schools .

Based on my experience as a teacher, trainer, and sex education expert, here are my top three guidelines for creating cultures of consent in our schools.

Discuss Consent in All Its Forms

Consent is not as simple as a cup of tea (as an infamous video would have it). We’ve all grown up in a culture that promotes assault and harassment—through movies, music, and advertisements, we’re fed a steady stream of stories about unhealthy relationships that are presented as romantic, seductive, or humorous. Interpersonal communication continues to follow scripts that promote dishonesty and toxic gender roles—with boys being depicted as sexually insatiable and never victimized, and girls as either “good” and sexually pure, or “at-risk” and hypersexualized.

All of these depictions feed into the concept we call rape culture: the beliefs, myths, and social scripting that promote and maintain sexual violence.

Consent is far more than “no means no,” and even “yes means yes” does not cover all the dynamics involved in authentic, affirmative, and enthusiastic consent. Consider the concepts of token resistance (TR) and token compliance (TC). TR is the expectation of a no when the individual really wants to say yes—e.g., “good girls” are supposed to not like sex, and their no supposedly masks their genuine desires. TC is the flip side: a person saying yes under pressure when they’d rather say no. To educate on consent, we must address these points honestly.

School districts and educators can bridge the gap in subject matter competency around the affirmative consent paradigm by bringing in sex education experts. Sexuality and consent are topics that many educators hesitate to bring up because of a lack of resources and understanding of how to address these deeply complex topics appropriately with children, tweens, and teens, and a sex education expert can help.

Having these conversations in health classes where sex and relationships are already discussed is too limiting to create the shift in cultural values that we need to heal the structural inequalities that lead to sexual misconduct and abuse. We need to train all teachers and administrators on sexual misconduct, consent, dating violence, and reporting and response obligations under Title IX. We then need to infuse these conversations across the curriculum so that students receive these messages consistently throughout their school years.

Explain Sexual Agency and Subjectivity

Sexual agency is the ability to assert sexual needs, desires, and boundaries effectively. Sexual subjectivity is an individual’s ability to reflect on their sexual needs, identity, and rights to pleasure. Together, these concepts form the foundation for creating cultures of consent.

All communal transformation begins with empowering the individual. We can help students unlearn messages about sexual shame, victim-blaming, and slut-shaming, and teach them about body image, sexual empowerment, and their right to sexual pleasure and autonomy. Doing so can shift the current paradigm. Not including sexual pleasure in the conversations we have in sex education classes, for example, feeds into the cultural norms that lead to sexual abuse .

Promote Healthy Relationships for Everyone

Part of creating a consent culture is exploring what defines a healthy relationship. Any time two or more people are interacting—whether in friendship, flirting and dating, or long-term and marital relationships—both empathy and consent must be present.

Conversations that assume that everyone is cisgender or heterosexual are not the answer, and neither are ones that paint every victim of assault as female (they aren’t) and every perpetrator as male (women and girls commit abuse and assault too).

We must break away from these stereotypes and decolonize these discussions. Every culture, ethnicity, and religion has a unique perspective on and expectation for courtship, love, and sex. Ensuring that consent is culturally humble and inclusive is key to guaranteeing its applicability in every community.

We must look critically at whether our depictions of sexuality are centered on straight, white, or cisgendered narratives. If the curriculum or facilitators are focusing on a limited cultural perspective, we should consult with consent educators from other cultures and communities to ensure that messages are inclusive and not resting on a framework of Western moral superiority.

When do we begin this work? As soon as our children can understand language. The seeds of consent are planted in the way we show our children how to share, how to ask before touching or taking, and that every person has the inalienable right to their body.

Our children need to know their right to assert their ability to say no and to require an authentic yes from even those in positions of power. This cannot begin soon enough, because consent is about so much more than sex—it is about the human rights that we are gifted at birth. Schools are in a uniquely important position to do this challenging, grassroots work.

Peter DeWitt's

Finding common ground.

A former K-5 public school principal turned author, presenter, and leadership coach, DeWitt provides insights and advice for education leaders. He can be found at www.petermdewitt.com . Read more from this blog .

Should Sex Education Be Taught in Schools?

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Thinking about sex education conjures up all of those uncomfortable moments as an adolescent when we had to sit at our desks and listen to our health teachers talk about things that we joked about with friends but never wanted to have a conversation about with adults. But things have changed a lot since then.

There has been an increase in the number of LGBT students who have come out while in high school, or sometimes, even middle school. We are surrounded images that inspire conversations about sex education and other images created by fashion that offer so much skin that there is nothing left to the imagination.

AVERT defines Sex Education as

the process of acquiring information and forming attitudes and beliefs about sex, sexual identity, relationships and intimacy. Sex education is also about developing young people’s skills so that they make informed choices about their behaviour, and feel confident and competent about acting on these choices.

First and foremost, there is a debate between the use of sexual education programs, where they openly teach about sex and prevention, and abstinence-only programs, which Advocates for Youth say,

• “has as its exclusive purpose teaching the social, psychological, and health gains to be realized by abstaining from sexual activity;
• teaches abstinence from sexual activity outside of marriage is the expected standard for all school-age children;
• teaches that abstinence from sexual activity is the only certain way to avoid out-of-wedlock pregnancy, sexually transmitted diseases, and other associated health problems;
• teaches that a mutually faithful monogamous relationship in the context of marriage is the expected standard of sexual activity;
• teaches that sexual activity outside the context of marriage is likely to have harmful psychological and physical side effects;
• teaches that bearing children out-of-wedlock is likely to have harmful consequences for the child, the child’s parents, and society;
• teaches young people how to reject sexual advances and how alcohol and drug use increase vulnerability to sexual advances, and
• teaches the importance of attaining self-sufficiency before engaging in sexual activity.”

Advocates for Youth also believe,

Accurate, balanced sex education - including information about contraception and condoms - is a basic human right of youth. Such education helps young people to reduce their risk of potentially negative outcomes, such as unwanted pregnancies and sexually transmitted infections (STIs). Such education can also help youth to enhance the quality of their relationships and to develop decision-making skills that will prove invaluable over life. This basic human right is also a core public health principle that receives strong endorsement from mainstream medical associations, public health and educational organizations, and - most important - parents.

But is it the job of teachers in schools to educate students about sex or is it the job of the parents? According to the National Conference of State Legislatures ,

All states are somehow involved in sex education for public schoolchildren. As of Jan. 1, 2015: 22 states and the District of Columbia require public schools teach sex education (20 of which mandate sex education and HIV education). 33 states and the District of Columbia require students receive instruction about HIV/AIDS. 19 states require that if provided, sex education must be medically, factually or technically accurate. State definitions of “medically accurate” vary, from requiring that the department of health review curriculum for accuracy, to mandating that curriculum be based on information from “published authorities upon which medical professionals rely.” Many states define parents’ rights concerning sexual education: 37 states and the District of Columbia require school districts to allow parental involvement in sexual education programs. Three states require parental consent before a child can receive instruction. 35 states and the District of Columbia allow parents to opt-out on behalf of their children.

Of course, if it’s taught in schools, how properly are the students being educated? This debate between whether it’s the school’s job or a parent’s job will last for a very long time, and quite frankly it is an area that many parents and teachers may agree. There are parents who do not want their children to be taught sex education in schools, just as there are some teachers who don’t think it is their job to teach it.

On the other side are parents and teachers who agree it should be taught in schools and at home because it is a topic that we all cannot escape. And I’m sure there are a bunch of people in the middle who do not even want to discuss the topic at all and just hope for the best.

The NPR story, called “Beyond The Birds And The Bees: Surviving Sex Ed Today” ( which can be heard here ) inspired me to think about all of the places that the topic of sex comes up in conversation. Sometimes it’s through jokes on television or social media, other times it’s in stories on the news, and most times it’s the center of the conversation on the back of a school bus. Whether it makes us uncomfortable or not, we can’t seem to escape the topic.

In the NPR story, Lena Solow, a teacher of ten years,

Covers the topics you’d expect: how to prevent STDs, pregnancy. But Solow talks about way more than going all the way. “One of my biggest goals as a sex educator is to be sex-positive,” she explains, “to talk about pleasure and to talk about sex not just as something that just makes babies.”

Listening to the story made me blush a little as I drove alone in my car through Massachusetts, and made me laugh a bit when Solow said that when she was a student her sex education class was taught by the physical education teacher and revolved around spelling tests.

Yes, spelling tests. She said,

“I definitely had spelling tests as a big part of my sex-ed when I was in middle school: ‘Spell gonorrhea. Spell gonococcus. Now you pass or don’t pass health.’ Literally, that was what was prioritized.”

She wants her students to have a much more knowledgeable experience, and she also explores topics that are unfortunately still controversial in today’s schools, which is the topic of LGBT students. In the NPR story, Garsd writes,

“Beyond the basics, Solow is delving into topics that many teachers would skirt. Things like tolerance. Solow recently asked her students if they thought LGBT people would feel comfortable at the school. A lot of the kids say they didn’t think so.”

It’s definitely a complicated debate, which will last for a very long time. What are your thoughts?

The opinions expressed in Peter DeWitt’s Finding Common Ground are strictly those of the author(s) and do not reflect the opinions or endorsement of Editorial Projects in Education, or any of its publications.

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Let’s Talk About Sex

Comprehensive sex education matters more than you might think.

The Harvard Independent’s Sex Survey is an annual source of amusement for me. I love reading about my anonymous classmates’ sexual exploits, but it always gets me thinking: How many of us are actually aware of what safer sex looks like, and how many of us properly put that safer sex into practice? How many of us know what consent looks like in practice? While educational standards in subjects like math or English tend to be relatively standardized across the country, the standards for sex education in the United States are all over the place—a “hot mess,” so to speak.

Let’s be honest. Sex happens. It happens to college students. It also happens before college. We don’t talk about it, but it happens. How many Americans under 21 are denied a proper education before they have sex for the first time?

Let me pause here and explain what I mean by a “proper education.” Proper sex education is medically accurate. Proper sex education is culturally appropriate and age appropriate. Proper sex includes information on multiple forms of STI and pregnancy prevention–not just abstinence. Proper sex education teaches us how to ask for and give affirmative consent. Especially in light of recent survey results , I’m inclined to say that we’re all deserving of a proper sex education.

Other countries have beaten us to the punch on this one. The Netherlands made headlines earlier this year for their comprehensive sexuality education curriculum, which starts in schools when kids are as young as four years old. The conversation begins with having crushes and giving consent to hugs and other forms of nonsexual intimacy. In later years, the curriculum introduces conversations about self-image and gender, finally arriving at conversations about sexual orientation and contraceptive options. Seems legit.

The results speak for themselves. The World Bank reports that the 2013 teen birth rate in the Netherlands was close to one-seventh of the U.S. teen birth rate. I’d like to hope that there’s a causative relationship between unplanned pregnancy in adolescents and the quality of the sexuality education that they receive in school. What is the U.S. doing wrong?

Let’s take, for example, my home state. New York—a seemingly progressive place. I did some research to contextualize my own disappointing experiences with sex education in school. The shocker: Sex education actually isn’t mandated in New York’s public schools. Further, New York has no legislative requirements for sex education when public schools choose to provide it. Though it was vastly incomplete, I received any sexual education at all only because I happened to attend a public school, one that radically decided to give its students an awkward briefing on their sexualities. In fact, only 22 states plus Washington, D.C., mandate sex education. Only 13 states require that sex education be medically accurate. I guess the rest of the nation’s sex educators can pull their information from simply wherever—and I’m not confident that our parents can handle the medically accurate conversations that we need answered on their own.

I’m sure that some New Yorkers receive age appropriate, culturally competent, inclusive sexuality education. I just wasn’t one of them. My sex education emphasized abstinence, focused on grossing me out with pictures of sexually transmitted diseases, and taught me nothing about how to have safer sex as a lesbian. I walked away from health class with a vague understanding of the risks of sex, the importance of condoms in HIV prevention, and the value of abstinence in preventing the spread of STIs. That’s a good sign, since New York does mandate discussion of HIV prevention that includes information on condoms while stressing abstinence. But there is so much more to say about sex.

In addition to information gaps in sex education, there’s an awkwardness that surrounds the conversation. If we’re just talking about how to prevent STIs and unintended pregnancy, we’re having an incomplete conversation. How can we normalize sex and sexuality? Why do sex education programs mobilize fear as a teaching tool? Why aren’t sex education programs required to emphasize consent in each and every sexual and nonsexual encounter we have? How can we include diverse sexualities and gender identities in conversations about STIs and unintended pregnancy prevention?

I’d like to see sexuality education that focuses on sexuality as a part of a broader humanity. Most humans are sexual beings. Humans experience sexual attraction in different ways, and those differences are completely okay. There are safe and unsafe ways to act on sexual attraction, and partners should have a conversation about how they will be safe in their sexual encounters beforehand. Acting on sexual attraction should only occur when everyone gives consent to those actions. It’s normal to take pleasure when safely and consensually acting on sexual attraction. It’s really that simple. There are clear ways to translate these concepts into different age-appropriate and culturally competent contexts. In fact, the Sexuality Information and Education Council of the United States has already done it.

Learning how to talk about my body without blushing, learning that saying no and saying yes are important parts of sex, and learning that my attractions are normal—these are really basic components of the comprehensive sex education that I didn’t receive. Comprehensive discussion of my identity, my body, my safety, and my rights would have been incredibly helpful for high-school me. I’m glad we’ve got Sex Week and Sexual Health And Relationship Counselors (formerly PCC) on campus, but our pre-college sex educations could have probably been better, right? Advocating for standardized comprehensive sexuality education is the next step toward removing the awkwardness and increasing the safety, pleasure, and comfort of each and every encounter we engage in.

Brianna J. Suslovic ’16 is a joint social anthropology and studies of women, gender, and sexuality concentrator in Winthrop House. Her column appears on alternate Fridays.

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Sex Education in the Spotlight: What Is Working? Systematic Review

Associated data.

The data presented in this study are available from the corresponding author on reasonable request.

Adolescence, a period of physical, social, cognitive and emotional development, represents a target population for sexual health promotion and education when it comes to achieving the 2030 Agenda goals for sustainable and equitable societies. The aim of this study is to provide an overview of what is known about the dissemination and effectiveness of sex education programs and thereby to inform better public policy making in this area. Methodology : We carried out a systematic review based on international scientific literature, in which only peer-reviewed papers were included. To identify reviews, we carried out an electronic search of the Cochrane Database Reviews, ERIC, Web of Science, PubMed, Medline, Scopus and PsycINFO. This paper provides a narrative review of reviews of the literature from 2015 to 2020. Results : 20 reviews met the inclusion criteria (10 in school settings, 9 using digital platforms and 1 blended learning program): they focused mainly on reducing risk behaviors (e.g., VIH/STIs and unwanted pregnancies), whilst obviating themes such as desire and pleasure, which were not included in outcome evaluations. The reviews with the lowest risk of bias are those carried out in school settings and are the ones that most question the effectiveness of sex education programs. Whilst the reviews of digital platforms and blended learning show greater effectiveness in terms of promoting sexual and reproductive health in adolescents (ASRH), they nevertheless also include greater risks of bias. Conclusion : A more rigorous assessment of the effectiveness of sexual education programs is necessary, especially regarding the opportunities offered by new technologies, which may lead to more cost-effective interventions than with in-person programs. Moreover, blended learning programs offer a promising way forward, as they combine the best of face-to-face and digital interventions, and may provide an excellent tool in the new context of the COVID-19 pandemic.

1. Introduction

Adolescence is a period of transition, growth, exploration and opportunities that the World Health Organization defines as referring to individuals between 10 years and 19 years of age [ 1 ]. During this life phase, adolescents undergo physical, psychological and sexual maturation and tend to develop an increased interest in sex and relationships, with positive relationships becoming strongly linked to sexual and reproductive health as well as overall wellbeing [ 2 ]. Sexual health is understood as a state of wellness comprising physical, emotional, mental, and social dimensions [ 3 ]: it represents one of the necessary requirements to achieve the general objective of sustainable and equitable societies in terms of the 2030 Agenda [ 4 ], which advocates the need for a sexual education that is anchored in a gender- and human rights-oriented perspective.

In high-income countries, sexual debut usually occurs during adolescence [ 5 ], though research suggests that sexual initiation is increasingly occurring at earlier ages [ 6 ]. Adolescents have to deal with the results of unhealthy sexual behaviors, including unplanned pregnancies and sexually transmitted infections [ 7 ], as well as experiences of sexual violence [ 8 , 9 ]. Adolescents are aware that they need more knowledge in order to enjoy healthy relationships [ 10 ], yet do not receive enough of the kind of information from parents or other formal sources that would allow them to develop a more positive, respectful experience of sexuality and sexual relationships [ 11 ].

Sexual education can be defined as any combination of learning experiences aimed at facilitating voluntary behavior conducive to sexual health. Sex education during adolescence has centered on the delivery of content (abstinence-only vs. comprehensive instruction) by teachers, parents, health professionals or community educators, and on the context (within school and beyond) of such delivery [ 12 ]. As regards content, the proponents of abstinence-only programs aim to help young adults avoid unintended pregnancies and sexually transmitted diseases (STDs), working on the assumption that while contraceptive use merely reduces the risk, abstinence will eliminate it entirely [ 13 ]. Nevertheless, an overwhelming majority of studies in this field have shown that programs advocating abstinence-only-until-marriage (AOUM) are neither effective in delaying sexual debut nor in changing other sexual risk behaviors [ 14 , 15 ], and participants in abstinence-only sex education programs consider that these had only a low impact in their lives [ 16 ]. On the other hand, holistic and comprehensive approaches to sex education go beyond risk behaviors and acknowledge other important aspects, as for example love, relationships, pleasure, sexuality, desire, gender diversity and rights, in accordance with internationally established guidelines [ 17 ], and with the 2030 Agenda [ 4 ]. Comprehensive Sexuality Education (CSE) “plays a central role in the preparation of young people for a safe, productive, fulfilling life” (p. 12) [ 17 ] and adolescents who receive comprehensive sex education are more likely to delay their sexual debut, as well as to use contraception during sexual initiation [ 18 ]. Comprehensive sexual education initiatives thereby promote sexual health in a way that involves not only the biological aspects of sexuality but also its psychological and emotional aspects, allowing young people to have enjoyable and safe sexual experiences.

With regard to context, sexual education may occur in different settings. School settings are key sites for implementing sexual education and for promoting adolescent sexual health [ 19 ], but today internet is becoming an increasingly important source of information and advice on these topics [ 20 ]. Access to the internet by adolescents is almost universal in high-income countries. The ubiquity and accessibility of digital platforms result in adolescents spending a great deal of time on the internet, and the search for information is the primary purpose of health-related internet use [ 21 ]. At the same time, this widespread use of technology by young people offers interesting possibilities for sexual health education programs, given the ease of access, availability, low cost, and the possibility of participating remotely [ 22 ]. The topics that young people search for online include information on everyday health-related issues, physical well-being and sexual health [ 23 ]. The majority of internet users of all ages in the US (80%) search online for health information including sexual health information [ 24 ], and among adolescents social media platforms are the most frequent means of obtaining information about health, especially regarding sexuality [ 25 ].

Thanks to the ubiquity and popularity of technologies, digital media interventions for sexual education offer a promising way forward, both via the internet (eHealth) and via mobile phones (mHealth, a specific way of promoting eHealth), given the privacy and anonymity they afford, especially for young people. Digital interventions in school—both inside and outside the classroom—offer interesting possibilities, because of their greater flexibility with regard to a variety of learning needs and benefits in comparison with traditional, face-to-face interventions, and because they offer ample opportunities for customization, interactivity as well as a safe, controlled, and familiar environment for transmitting sexual health knowledge and skills [ 26 ]. As Garzón-Orjuela et al. [ 27 ] argues, contemporary adolescents’ needs are mediated by their digital and technological environment, making it important to adapt interventions in the light of these realities. Online searches for sexual health information are likely to become increasingly important for young people with diminishing access to information from schools or health care providers in the midst of the lockdowns and widespread school closures during the COVID-19 pandemic [ 28 ], with more than two million deaths and 94 million people infected around the world [ 29 ]. Specifically, blended learning programs, consisting of internet-based educational interventions complemented by face-to-face interventions, may prove a significant addition to regular secondary school sex education programs [ 30 , 31 ]. Blended learning programs can be especially helpful in promoting sexual and reproductive health in the context of the COVID-19 pandemic, which is challenging the way we have so far approached formal education, with its focus on face to face interventions, given the need, now more than ever, to “develop and disseminate online sex education curricula, and ensure the availability of both in-person and online instruction in response to school closures caused by the pandemic” [ 28 ].

The present study sets out to research the dissemination and effectiveness in different settings (school, digital and blended learning) of sex education programs that promote healthy and positive relationships and the reduction of risk behaviors, so as to make current sexual health interventions more effective [ 32 ]. Numerous researchers have carried out trials and systematic reviews so as to evaluate the effectiveness of school-based sexual health and relationship education [ 19 , 27 , 33 , 34 , 35 ], as well as that of digital platform programs [ 36 , 37 , 38 , 39 ]. However, there has not been a review that is representative of the literature as a whole. Furthermore, in the reviews that have been carried out, differing aims and inclusion criteria have led to differences in the sampling of available primary studies [ 19 ]. As Garzón-Orjuela et al. [ 27 ] asserts, the field of adolescent sex education is continuously evolving and in need of evaluation and improvement. Better assessments are necessary in order to clarify whether they offer a viable and effective strategy for influencing adolescents, especially with respect to improved ASRH behaviors. Hence, given the need for an up-to-date revision so as to consider more recent emerging evidence in this field, in this study we carry out a review of reviews that includes reviews of interventions both in school settings and via digital platforms, as well as, for the first time, those that combine both formats (blended learning).

The decision to conduct a review of reviews (RoR), assessing the quality and summarizing the findings of existing systematic reviews, rather than working directly with primary intervention studies, addresses the need to include as wide a range of topics covered within the field of sex education as possible [ 40 ]. As Schackleton et al. [ 35 ] (p. 383) point out, in order to provide overviews of research evidence that are relevant to policy making, it is important “to bring together evidence on different forms of intervention and on different outcomes because it is useful for policy makers to know what is the range of approaches previously evaluated and whether these have consistent effects across different outcomes.” Carrying out and publicly sharing reviews of reviews such as the present study constitutes one way of better providing practitioners with evidence they can then carry over into their interventions [ 32 ].

2. Methodology

(1) To systematically review existing reviews of Sex Education (SE) of school-based (face-to-face), digital platforms and blended learning programs for adolescent populations in high-income countries.

(2) To summarize evidence relating to effectiveness.

2.2. Methods

The review is structured in accordance with the PRISMA checklist (Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Reviews and Meta-Analysis) (see Figure A1 ), and the systematic review protocol has previously been published on the PROSPERO International Prospective Registry of Technical Reviews (CRD42021224537).

2.3. Search Strategy

This systematic review is based on international scientific literature and only peer- reviewed papers have been included. Only meta-analyses (publications that combine results from different studies) and systematic reviews (literature reviews that synthesize high-quality research evidence) were used for this review. Findings from reviews of reviews were not analyzed. To identify reviews, we electronically searched the Cochrane Database Reviews, ERIC, Web of Science, PubMed, Medline, Scopus and PsycINFO. After the list was completed the duplicated papers were automatically removed. Two reviewers working independently applied inclusion criteria in screening citations by titles, abstracts, and keywords to identify records for full-text review. A third reviewer reconciled any disagreement. The same procedure was carried out in screening the full text of studies selected after the title and abstract screening phase. Two reviewers then examined the full text of each article to determine which satisfied inclusion criteria. Data extraction was carried out independently by the first and second reviewer. The extracted data included specific details about the interventions, populations, study methods and outcomes significant to the review question and objective. Any discrepancies were discussed until consensus was reached. Search terms are included in Table A1 .

This RoR included the reviews published since 2015, when the United Nations decided on new Global Sustainable Development Goals, until December 2020. The 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development [ 4 ] takes into account the relevance of Sexual Health to achieve peace and prosperity.

2.4. Inclusion Criteria

We extracted data using a “Population, Intervention, Comparison, Outcome” structure, PICO [ 41 ].

Population: Reviews of interventions targeting adolescents (aged 10–19 years), school-setting, digital platforms or blended learning education were eligible for inclusion. Reviews in which studies of interventions targeted youth and adults were eligible if the primary studies included people between the ages of 10–19 years.

Intervention: Reviews of interventions developed in school-setting (school-based), digital (digital platforms) or blended learning programs were included. Interventions based on multiple settings or targeted multiple health-related issues were only considered for inclusion if any primary studies were linked to school-based, digital or blended learning interventions, as well as targeting Sexual and Reproductive Health (SRH).

Comparison groups: Randomized controlled trials (RCTs) and studies using a quasi-experimental design (including non-randomized trials—nRCTs). Single group, pre- and post-test research designs, group exposed to sexual education (SE) program (school-based, digital platforms or blended learning) compared with non-exposed control group or another intervention.

Outcomes: Primary outcomes: (1) Sexual behavior and (2) Health and social outcomes related to sexual health. Secondary outcomes: (1) Knowledge and understanding of sexual health and relationship issues and (2) Attitudes, values and skills.

2.5. Exclusion Criteria

Reviews were excluded if:

• Their primary focus was adult people and adolescents were not included.
• Their primary focus was sexual-health screening, sexual abuse or assault or prevention of sexual abuse or rape.
• The studies targeted specific populations (e.g., pre-pubertal children, children with developmental disorders, migrant and refugee, or sexual minorities).
• The interventions focused on low- and middle-income countries or if high income countries were not included in the study.
• Recipients were professionals, teachers, parents or a combination of the latter.

2.6. Risk of Bias and Assessment of Study Quality

Review quality was assessed by the first author using the AMSTAR II checklist [ 42 ]. This is an updating and adaptation of AMSTAR [ 43 , 44 ] which allows a more detailed assessment of systematic reviews that include randomized or non-randomized studies of healthcare interventions, or both. It consists of a 16-item tool (including 5 critical domains) assessing the quality of a review’s design, its search strategy, inclusion and exclusion criteria, quality assessment of included studies, methods used to combine the findings, likelihood of publication bias and statements of conflict of interest. The maximum quality score is 16.

2.7. Data Synthesis

After manually coding the papers and extracting relevant data, we used a narrative/descriptive approach for data synthesis to summarize characteristics of the studies included. Considering the heterogeneity of outcomes, their measures and research designs, meta-analysis of all the studies included was not carried out. Two researchers were involved in data synthesis. Discrepancies were resolved through discussion, and a third researcher was consulted to resolve any remaining discrepancies. For the classification of the information and presentation of the effects of the interventions reported, data was separated (school setting, digital platforms or blended learning) and structured around population, intervention, comparison, and outcome. To address the main review questions, data was synthesized in two phases. Phase 1 addressed the first question, the description of sex education/sexual health interventions. Phase 2 addressed the second question, the effectiveness and benefit of the interventions; studies with a low risk of bias were highlighted, so as to strengthen the reliability of findings (AMSTAR II) [ 42 ].

3.1. Results of Search

Our searches yielded 1476 unique citations. After excluding 776 records based on title and abstract screening, we reviewed 217 full-text articles for eligibility, of which 20 ultimately met inclusion criteria, and proceeded to data extraction. Of the 197 studies that we excluded after full-text review, 82 were carried out in low- and middle-income countries, 47 targeted exclusively adults, 56 dealt with minority groups, and 12 targeted exclusively pre-teen students.

3.2. Risk of Bias in Included Studies

According to the AMSTAR II quality assessment tool’s developers [ 42 ] scores may range from 1 to 16: in this case only 2 reviews scored 16 out of 16: 1 in a school setting [ 45 ], and 1 on a digital platform [ 46 ]. 6 of the 20 systematic reviews were of high quality: 5 in school settings [ 45 , 47 , 48 , 49 , 50 ], and 1 in digital platforms [ 46 ]; there was one study of medium quality in a school setting [ 51 ]. The remaining studies were of low or very low quality (N = 13). It is possible that low quality reviews may not provide reliable evidence, so those scoring in low and critically low quality should be regarded skeptically.

3.3. Reviews Included

Key information regarding the 20 reviews included is shown in Table A2 and Table A3 .

3.3.1. Setting

Ten studies (50%) dealt with school-based interventions [ 45 , 47 , 48 , 49 , 50 , 51 , 52 , 53 , 54 , 55 ], 9 (45%) referred to online interventions [ 46 , 56 , 57 , 58 , 59 , 60 , 61 , 62 , 63 ] and 1 (5%) was a review of blended learning programs [ 64 ]. In total 491 studies were included in the 20 reviews covered by the present RoR. The 10 reviews of school setting interventions include a total of 266 studies (54%), the 9 reviews of online interventions cover a total of 216 (44%) studies, and the only review of blended learning interventions includes a total of 9 studies (2%). All studies were conducted in high-income economies following the World Bank classification [ 65 ], including US samples in 16 of the 20 studies, although there are two studies in which the country of the sample is not identified [ 51 , 52 ]. Most of the studies evaluating interventions in school settings also include developing countries (low- and middle-income economies) [ 45 , 47 , 50 , 52 , 53 , 55 ], as is also the case in three reviews of online interventions [ 46 , 61 , 62 ] (see Table A2 ).

3.3.2. Population

The targeted age for reviews in school settings, as shown in Table A2 , is the period of adolescence, from 10 to 19 years of age, though one of the studies covers ages from 7 to 19 years [ 53 ]. All the online studies also include young adults (20–24 years old), alongside the adolescent sample [ 46 , 56 , 57 , 59 , 60 , 61 , 62 , 63 ], whilst the review by DeSmet et al. [ 58 ] extends the upper limit to 29 years of age. Along with the sample of adolescents and young adults, the blended learning studies review also incorporates adults of over 25 years of age [ 64 ].

3.3.3. Interventions/Types of Study

All the studies included in this review of reviews used randomized controlled trials (RCTs), non-randomized controlled trials (non-RCT), and a quasi-experimental design or a pre-test/post-test design to examine program effects.

3.3.4. Outcomes

The term “sexual outcomes” refers to the attitudes, behaviors, and experiences of adolescents consequent to their sex education [ 14 ] (p. 1), and an extensive range of variables was included (see Table A2 ): knowledge (e.g., knowledge of contraceptive effectiveness or effective method use); attitudes (e.g., about sex and reproductive health); beliefs (e.g., self-efficacy); skills (e.g., condom skills); intentions/motivation (e.g., use of birth control methods; condom use); behaviors (e.g., sexual debut; condom use; contraception use; intercourse; initiation of sexual activity) and; other outcomes related to sexual behavior (e.g., pregnancy prevalence; number of partners; rates of sexually transmissible infections (STIs); cervical screening; appreciation of sexual diversity; dating and intimate partner violence prevention; sexual violence).

3.3.5. Country of Review

Of the 10 reviews of interventions in school settings, the authors are from the USA in 7 reviews [ 47 , 48 , 49 , 50 , 53 , 54 , 55 ], from the United Kingdom in 1 [ 45 ], from Australia in 1 [ 51 ], and from Thailand in 1 [ 52 ]. Of the 9 reviews of interventions in digital settings, the authors are from the United States in 3 reviews [ 59 , 60 , 63 ], from the United Kingdom in 2 [ 46 , 56 ], from Australia in 1 [ 62 ], from Belgium in 1 [ 58 ], from France in 1 [ 61 ] and from Turkey in 1 [ 57 ]. The authors of the blended learning review are from the USA [ 64 ].

3.3.6. Year of Last Paper Included

The studies cited in the reviews that met the inclusion criteria for this review were published over a wide range of years (between 1981–2019), although only one [ 61 ], with articles published up to and including 2019 was published later than 2017. Of these, 3 were carried out in school settings [ 49 , 51 , 53 ], and 1 on digital platforms [ 46 ].

3.3.7. Search Tools

All reviews include more than 2 tools to carry out the search, in a range of 3–12, and in 7 of them the review of gray literature was included.

3.3.8. Multicenter Studies and Number of Studies Included

All reviews from school settings are multicenter, except that of Mirzazadeh et al. [ 49 ], which includes only one North American sample. The same is true for the blended learning review [ 64 ] and for the reviews of digital platforms, except for the reviews by Bailey et al. [ 56 ], L´Engle et al. [ 60 ], and Widman et al. [ 63 ]. Regarding the number of countries included in the reviews, the range in the school-setting reviews is from 1 to 11, in digital platforms reviews from 1 to 16, and in the only review of blended learning, 3. As for the range of studies included, in the reviews in school setting the range is between 8 and 80, in digital platforms, between 5 and 60, and in the only review of reviews of blended learning 9 studies were included.

3.3.9. Number of Reviews Covered That Include Meta-Analysis

As for the number of reviews that carry out a meta-analysis, there are 8 in total: 4 in school settings [ 45 , 48 , 49 , 55 ] and 4 on digital platforms [ 43 , 46 , 56 , 58 ], while in the only review of blended learning there is no meta- analysis.

3.4. Effectiveness

3.4.1. school settings.

Half of the reviews conclude that interventions are not effective in promoting healthy sexual behaviors and/or reducing risks [ 45 , 47 , 48 , 49 , 50 ]. These reviews are of high quality and with a reduced risk of bias (see Table A4 ), so that the results are highly reliable, even though in most of the studies cited the risk of bias was judged to be high and the quality of evidence was low or very low. These reviews include those of the Marseille et al. [ 48 ] and Mirzazadeh et al. [ 49 ] team, who in two studies—each led by one of the two authors—analyze, on the one hand, the effectiveness of school-based teen pregnancy prevention programs [ 48 ], and, on the other hand, the effectiveness of school-based programs prevent HIV and other sexually transmitted infections in North America [ 49 ]. The results of the studies question the usefulness of interventions carried out in schools to prevent both unwanted pregnancies and the incidence of HIV and other sexual transmitted infections in adolescents in North America. In addition to these results, those of Lopez et al. [ 47 ] focus on analyzing the effectiveness of programs implemented in schools to promote the use of contraceptive methods and conclude that many trials reported contraceptive use as an outcome but did not take into consideration whether contraceptive methods and their relative effectiveness were part of the content. For its part, the review by Mason-Jones et al. [ 45 ] also concludes that the educational programs covered had no significant effect as regards the prevalence of HIV or other STIs (herpes simplex virus, moderate evidence and syphilis, low evidence), nor was there any apparent effect in terms of the number of pregnancies at the end of the trial (moderate evidence). Finally, the review by Oringanje et al. [ 50 ] finds only limited evidence for program effects on biological measures, and inconsistent results for behavioral (secondary) outcomes across trials and concludes that it was only the interventions which combined education and contraception promotion (multiple interventions) that led to a significant reduction in unintended pregnancies over the medium- and long-term follow-up period.

In contrast to these negative results in terms of the effectiveness of the programs implemented in the school environment (identified in 5 of the 10 reviews included), 3 of the 10 reviews concluded that the programs evaluated were mostly effective in promoting knowledge, attitudes and/or in reducing risk behaviors [ 51 , 52 , 53 ] whilst programs were effective in terms of some of the primary outcomes in the reviews by Haberland et al., [ 54 ], and Peterson et al. [ 55 ]. However, these data must be taken with caution since the level of bias in these reviews—excepting that of Kedzior et al. [ 51 ] with a medium quality level—is at a low or critically low-quality level. In the review by Chokprajakchad et al. [ 52 ], 22 programs reviewed were effective in changing targeted adolescent psychosocial and/or behavioral outcomes, in 12 of 17 studies evaluating delay in the initiation of sexual intercourse, the programs were effective and many of the reviewed studies demonstrated impacts on short-term outcomes, such as knowledge, attitudes, perception and intention. The review by Goldfarb et al. [ 53 ] identifies changes in appreciation of sexual diversity, dating and intimate partner violence prevention, healthy relationships, child sex abuse prevention and additional outcomes. According to the review by Kedzior et al. [ 51 ], focused on studies promoting social connectedness with regard to sexual and reproductive sexual health, the programs reviewed improved condom use, delayed initiation of sex, and reduced pregnancy rates. Additionally, in this review, program effectiveness was influenced by ethnicity and gender: greater improvements in condom use were often reported among African American students. For its part, in the study by Peterson et al. [ 55 ] the meta-analysis of three randomized trials provided some evidence that school-environment interventions may contribute to a later sexual debut while their narrative synthesis of other outcomes offered only mixed results.

Finally, the review by Haberland et al. [ 54 ], which focused on studies analyzing whether addressing gender and power in sexuality education curricula is associated with better outcomes, concluded that where interventions addressed gender or power (N = 10/22) there was a fivefold greater likelihood of effectiveness than in those that did not.

3.4.2. Online Platforms

The reviews included show a very diverse panorama of digital platforms used to carry out educational interventions (e.g., websites, social media, gaming, apps or text messaging and mailing), which makes it difficult to compare the results. Of the 9 reviews of studies included, only one—in which the effects of TCCMD (Targeted Client Communication delivered via Mobile Devices) are evaluated [ 46 ]—meets the quality criteria according to the AMSTAR II quality assessment tool [ 42 ] (see Table A4 ); the rest include biases that limit the reliability of the results so that these must be taken with caution. In the studies reviewed by Palmer et al. [ 46 ] among adolescents nine programs were delivered only via text messages; four programs used text messages in combination with other media (for example, emails, multimedia messaging, or voice calls); and one program used only voice calls.

When compared with more conventional approaches, interventions that use TCCMD may increase sexual health knowledge (low certainty evidence), and may modestly increase contraception use (low certainty evidence) while the effect on condom use remains unclear given the very low certainty evidence. Additionally, when compared with digital non-targeted communication, the effects TCCMD on sexual health knowledge, condom and contraceptive use are also unclear, again given the very low-certainty evidence. The review finds evidence of a modest beneficial intervention effect on contraceptive use among adolescent (and adult) populations, but that there was insufficient evidence to demonstrate that this translated into a reduction in contraception.

Most of the reviews included refer to changes to a greater or lesser extent [ 56 , 57 , 59 , 60 , 62 , 63 ], while no changes determined by the intervention were identified in the study by DeSmet et al. [ 58 ]. Finally, the review by Martin et al. [ 61 ] does not include details about changes as a result of the programs.

The review by L´Engle et al. [ 60 ] assesses mHealth mobile phone interventions for ASRH (almost all of which were carried out via SMS platforms, with the notable exception of only four of the programs covered which used other media formats instead of or as well as SMS). The interventions reviewed set out to foster positive and preventive SRH behaviors, augment take-up and continued use of contraception, support medication adherence for HIV-positive young people, support teenage parents, and encourage use of health screening and treatment services. Results from the studies covered in the review offer support for diverse uses of mobile phones in order to help further ASRH. The health promotion programs that made use of text messaging demonstrated robust acceptability and relevance for young people globally and contributed to improved SRH awareness, less unprotected sex, and more testing for STIs. However, the review also found that improved reporting on essential mHealth criteria is necessary in order to understand, replicate, and scale up mHealth interventions. Holstrom’s [ 59 ] review, focused on evaluations of internet-based sexual health interventions, finds that these were associated with greater sexual health knowledge and awareness, lower rates of unprotected sex and higher rates of condom use, as well as increased STI testing. Moreover, the review explores young people’s continuing use of and trust in internet as a source of information about sexual health, as well as the particular themes that interest them. Specifically, the study finds that young people want to know not only about STIs, but also about sexual pleasure, about how to talk with partners about their sexual desires, as well as about techniques to better pleasure their partners.

The review by Widman et al. [ 63 ] reveals a significant weighted mean effect of technology-based interventions on condom use and abstinence, the effects of which were not affected by age, gender, country, intervention, dose, interactivity, or program tailoring. The effects were more significant when evaluated with short-term (one to five months) follow-ups than with longer term (over six months) ones. Moreover, digital programs were more effective than control programs in contributing to sexual health knowledge and safer sex norms and attitudes. This meta-analysis, drawing on fifteen years of research into youth-oriented digital interventions, is clear evidence of their ability to contribute to safer sex behavior and awareness. In the review by Wadham et al. [ 62 ] the majority of studies used a web-based platform for their programs (16 out of 25). These web-based programs varied between complex, bespoke multimedia interventions to more simplified educational modules. Five studies employed SMS platforms both via mobile phone messaging and web-based instant message services. Three of the programs used social networking sites, either for live chat purposes or alongside a web-based platform. Several studies showed that variety in terms of media and platforms was associated with stronger positive responses among participants and improved outcomes. Eleven of the twenty-five studies focused specifically on HIV prevention, with seven finding a statistically significant effect of the program with regard to knowledge levels about prevention of HIV and other STIs, as well as about general sexual health knowledge. However, only twenty percent of the programs that assessed intended use of condoms reported significant effects due to the intervention.

The review by Bailey et al. [ 56 ] (p. 5) assesses interactive digital interventions (IDIs), defined as “digital media programs that provide health information and tailored decision support, behavioral-change support and/or emotional support” and focuses on the sexual well-being of young people between the ages of thirteen and twenty four in the United Kingdom. IDIs have significant though small effects on self-efficacy and sexual behavior, although there is not sufficient evidence to ascertain the effects on biological outcomes or other longer-term impacts. When comparing IDIs with in-person sexual health programs, the former demonstrate significant, moderate positive effects on sexual health knowledge, significant small effects on intention but no demonstrable effects on self-efficacy. The review by Celik et al. [ 57 ] looks at digital programs (the majority internet- and computer-based with only six making use of mobile phone-based applications) and sets out to understand their effectiveness in changing adolescents’ health behaviors. Findings from the studies ( n = 9) suggest that the digital interventions carried out with the adolescents generally had a positive effect on health-promoting behaviors. However, in another study focused on fostering HIV prevention [ 66 ], there was a statistically significant increase in health-promoting behavior in only one of the four studies reviewed.

In the review by DeSmet et al. [ 58 ], no significant behavioral changes as a result of the interventions for sexual health promotion using serious digital games are identified, although the interventions did have significant though small positive effects on outcomes. The fact that so few studies both met the inclusion criteria and also analyzed behavioral effects suggests the need to further investigate the effectiveness of this kind of game-based approach.

Finally, in the review by Martin et al. [ 61 ] 60 studies were covered, detailing a total of 37 interventions, though only 23 of the reviews included effectiveness results. A majority of the interventions were delivered via websites ( n = 20) while online social networks were the second most favored medium ( n = 13), mostly via Facebook ( n = 8). The programs under review favored online interaction, principally amongst peers ( n = 23) but also with professionals ( n = 16). The review concludes that ASHR programs promoting these kinds of online participation interventions have demonstrated feasibility, practical interest, and attractiveness, though their effectiveness has yet to be determined, given that they are still in the early stages of design and evaluation.

3.4.3. Blended Learning

In the only blended learning review included in our study [ 64 ], the authors conclude that blended learning approaches are being successfully applied in ASHR interventions, including in school-based programs, and have led to positive behavioral and psychosocial changes. However, these results should be treated with caution as the review does not follow the guidelines recommended in the AMSTAR II quality assessment tool [ 44 ] (see Table A4 ) and only includes nine studies.

4. Discussion

The present review of reviews assesses, for the first time jointly to our knowledge, the effectiveness of sexual education programs for the adolescent population (ASRH) developed in school settings, digital platforms and blended learning. Of the twenty reviews included (comprising a total of 491 programs, mostly from the USA), ten correspond to reviews of programs implemented in school settings, nine to those dealing with interventions via digital platforms and only one deals with studies relating to blended learning. Twelve (60%) of the reviews included (6 out of 10 in school settings, 5 out of 9 on digital platforms, and the only blended learning review) have been published in the last 3 years (between 2018 and 2020). Thus, the present study constitutes the most up-to-date and recent review of reviews incorporating several contemporary studies not covered by earlier reviews [ 19 , 27 , 33 , 35 , 36 , 37 , 38 , 39 ].

4.1. Interventions Reviewed

The interventions included in the reviews covered by our study were largely focused on reducing risk behaviors (e.g., VIH/STIs and unwanted pregnancies), and envisaging sex as a problem behavior. Programs reviewed often focused on the physical and biological aspects of sex, including pregnancy, STIs, frequency of sexual intercourse, use of condom, and reducing adolescents´ number of sexual partners. One exception is Golfard’s et al. [ 53 ] review about comprehensive sex education, which is centered on healthy relationships and sexual diversity, though it also makes reference to prevention of violence (dating and intimate partner violence prevention and sex abuse prevention). However, Golfard’s et al.’s [ 53 ] rejects more than 80% of the studies initially reviewed because they were focused solely on pregnancy and disease prevention. In the reviews of interventions on digital platforms and via blended learning all the outcomes focused on behaviors related to sexual health (focused on the prevention of risk behaviors), and in several cases also addressed perceived satisfaction and usability. These results are in line with other studies that confirm the over-attention given to risk behaviors, to the detriment of other more positive aspects of sexuality [ 67 , 68 ]. Teachers continue to perceive their responsibility as combating sexual risk, whilst viewing young people as immature and oversexualized [ 69 ], even as adolescents themselves express a preference for sex education with less emphasis on strictly negative sexual outcomes [ 16 ], and more emphasis on peer education [ 70 ].

As for more positive views of sexuality, only on rare occasions do interventions address issues such as sexual pleasure, desire and healthy relationships. Desire and pleasure were not included in the outcome evaluations for school settings, nor for digital and blended learning programs included in this review: again this is in line with the position of other authors cited in the present study, who advocate the need to also embrace the more positive aspects of sexuality [ 53 , 56 ]. Specifically, Bailey and colleagues [ 56 ] (p. 73) suggest as “optimal outcomes” social and emotional well-being in sexual health. Young people want to know about more than STIs, they also “want information about sexual pleasure, how to communicate with partners about what they want sexually and specific techniques to better pleasure their partners” [ 59 ] (p. 282). Similarly, Kedzior et al. [ 51 ] also argue for the need to move beyond a risk-aversion approach and towards one that places more emphasis on positive adolescent sexual and reproductive health.

Pleasure and desire are largely absent within sex and relationship education [ 71 ] and, when they are included, they are often proposed as part of a discourse on safe practice, where pleasure continues to be equated with danger [ 72 ]. The persistent absence of a “discourse of desire” in sex education [ 73 , 74 ] is especially problematic for women, for whom desire is still mediated by (positive) male attention, and for whom pleasure is derived from being found desirable and not from sexual self-expression or from their own desires [ 75 ]. Receiving sexualized attention from men makes women “feel good” by increasing their self-esteem and self-confidence [ 76 ]. However, it is still men who decide what is sexy and what is not, based on the attention they pay to women “girl watching”, [ 77 ] (p. 386), which leads the latter to self-objectify [ 78 ] with all the attendant negative consequences for their overall and sexual health [ 79 ]. In fact, women experience “pushes” and “pulls” [ 80 ] (p.393) with regard to sexualized culture. In one sense, the sexualization of culture has placed women in the position of subjects who desire, not just that of subjects who are desired, but at the same time it becomes a form of regulation in which young women are forced to assume the current sexualized ideal [ 81 , 82 ] in order to position themselves as “modern, liberated and feminine,” and avoid being seen as “outdated or prudish” [ 83 ] (p. 16). Koepsel [ 84 ] provides a holistic definition of pleasure as well as clear recommendations for how educators can overcome these deficits by incorporating pleasure into their existing curricula. At present, sexual education is still largely centered on questions of public health, and there is as yet no consensus on criteria for defining sexual well-being and other aspects of positive sexuality [ 85 ]. Patterson et al. [ 86 ] argue for the need to mandate “comprehensive, positive, inclusive and skills-based learning” to enhance people´s ability to develop healthy positive relationships throughout their lives.

The absence of desire and pleasure in the outcomes of the evaluated reviews is connected with the absence of gender-related outcomes. Only one of the reviews addresses the issue of gender and power in sexuality programs [ 54 ], illustrating how their inclusion can bring about a five-fold increase in the effectiveness of risk behavior prevention. Nonetheless, men are far less likely than women to sign up for a sexuality course, and as a result of masculine ideologies many young males experience negative attitudes towards sex education [ 87 ]. To date we still have little idea as to what are the “active ingredients” that can contribute to successfully encouraging men to challenge gender inequalities, male privilege and harmful or restrictive masculinities so as to help improve sexual and reproductive health for all [ 88 ] (p.16). Schmidt et al.’s [ 89 ] review looks at 10 evidence-based sexual education programs in schools: the majority discuss sexually transmitted diseases and unplanned pregnancy, abstinence, and contraceptive use, while very few address components related to healthy dating relationships, discussion of interpersonal violence or an understanding of gender roles.

The International Guidance on Sexuality Education [ 90 ], and the International Technical Guidance on Sexuality Education [ 17 ] promote the delivery of sexual education within a framework of human rights and gender equality to support children and adolescents in questioning social and cultural norms. The year 2020 marked the anniversaries of several path breaking policies, laws and events for women’s rights: the 100th anniversary of women´s suffrage in the United States; the 25th anniversary of the Beijing Platform for Action, a global roadmap for women´s empowerment; and, the 20th anniversary of the United Nations Security Council Resolution for a Women, Peace and Security agenda. Although there have been important advances in recent years in research relating to the inclusion of gender equality and human rights interventions in ASRH policies and programming still “fundamental gaps remain” [ 40 ] (p.14). Gender equality, and to an even greater extent human rights, have had very little presence in sexual and reproductive health programs and policies, and there is a pressing need to do more to address these issues systematically. Specifically, issues such as abortion and female genital mutilation, with clear repercussions in terms of gender equality and human rights, are rarely dealt with [ 40 ].

Furthermore, sexual education that privileges heterosexuality reinforces hegemonic attributes of femininity and masculinity, and ignores identities that distance themselves from these patterns. Our collective heteronormative legacy marginalizes and harms LGB families [ 91 ] and LGBTQ+-related information about healthy relationships is largely absent from sexual and reproductive health programs [ 92 ]. Students want a more LGBTQ+ inclusive curriculum [ 92 ]: in the present RoR one review [ 53 ] addresses the issue of non-heteronormative identity in sexuality programs with significant results; and other authors are exploring promising initiatives which are also challenging this lack of inclusivity [ 93 ] and rectifying heterosexual bias [ 94 ]. However, unfortunately, the underlying neoliberal focus of the majority of contemporary sexuality education militates to assimilate LGBTQ+ people into existing economic and social normative frameworks rather than helping disrupt them [ 95 ].

4.2. Effectiveness

This present review of reviews shows a variety of types of sexual health promotion initiatives across the three settings (school-based, digital and blended learning), with inconsistent results. The reviews with lower risk of bias are those carried out in school settings and those that are most critical regarding the effectiveness of programs promoting ASRH, both in the prevention of pregnancies and of HIV/STIs. Reviews dealing with digital platforms and blended learning show greater effectiveness in terms of promoting adolescent sexual health: however, these are also the studies that incorporate the highest risks of bias. Specifically, in digital platforms programs the great variety of alternatives makes comparability difficult. Moreover, these programs, along with blended learning, are in a more incipient state of evaluation, compared to school-setting evaluations, and present greater risks of lower quality than reviews in school settings.

The results of the present RoR are in line with those of previous RoRs [ 19 , 32 ]. The review of reviews by Denford et al.s´ [ 19 ] RoR covered 37 reviews up to 2016 and summarized 224 primary randomized controlled trials: whilst it concludes that school-based programs addressing risky sexual behavior can be effective, its reviews of exclusively school-based studies offer mixed results as to effectiveness in relation to attitudes, skills and behavioral change. Some of those studies report positive effects while others find there are no effects, if not even negative effects, in terms of the aforementioned outcomes [ 19 ]. As regards pregnancy, programs appear to be effective at increasing awareness regarding STIs and contraception but overall the findings suggest that the impact of these interventions on attitudes, behaviors and skills variables are mixed, with some studies leading to improvements whilst others show no change. Moreover, the fact that community-based programs were also taken into consideration might have led to the effectiveness of school-based programs being exaggerated [ 19 ].

However, although in our RoR the higher quality/lower bias studies—in keeping with the findings of previous reviews [ 19 , 33 ]—fail to show a clear pattern of effectiveness, the interventions could nevertheless be generating changes as Denford et al. [ 19 ] suggest, though not in the measured outcomes, bearing in mind the low incidence of sexual intercourse and pregnancy in school-going adolescents.

With regard to school settings, Peterson et al. [ 55 ] conclude that further, more rigorous evidence is necessary to evaluate the extent to which interventions addressing school-related factors are effective and to help better understand the mechanisms by which they may contribute to improving adolescent sexual health. With regard to digital platform programs, Wadham et al. [ 62 ] (p. 101) argue that “although new media has the capacity to expand efficiencies and coverage, the technology itself does not guarantee success.” An interesting observation in their review was that interventions which were either web-based adaptations of prior prevention programs, or were theory-based or had been developed from models of behavioral change appeared effective independently of the chosen digital media mode. However, digital programs are still in the early stages of design and evaluation, especially in terms of the effects of peer interaction and often diverge from existing theoretical models [ 61 ] (p. 13). The expert opinion-based proposal of the European Society for Sexual Medicine [ 96 ] argues that e-sexual health education can contribute to improving the sexual health of the population it seems the future of CSHE is moving towards smartphone apps [ 97 ].

However, “despite clear and compelling evidence for the benefits of high-quality curriculum-based CSE, few children and young people receive preparation for their lives that empowers them to take control and make informed decisions about their sexuality and relationships freely and responsibly” [ 17 ] (p. 12), and during “the current public health crisis, the sexual and reproductive health of adolescents and young adults must not be overlooked, as it is integral to both their and the larger society’s well-being” [ 28 ] (p. 9). In the light of these challenges, Coyle et al.’s [ 64 ] suggestion that the blended learning model may end up achieving a far more dominant role in the future of sexual education acquires even more relevance.

4.3. Limitations

This study represents the first review of reviews, as far as we are aware, in which the effectiveness of sex education programs in different settings (school-based, digital and blended learning) is evaluated, using a rich methodology and providing interesting conclusions. However, the present review of reviews is not without its limitations.

While systematic reviews and reviews of reviews can offer a way synthesizing large amounts of data, the great heterogeneity and diversity of measured outcomes make it difficult to establish a synthesis of the results, even more so in cases where it is not possible to apply meta-analysis. Furthermore, the quality of reviews of reviews is limited by that of the reviews they include and RoRs do not necessarily represent the leading edge research in the field.

In addition, although we searched for a wide range of keywords on the most commonly used databases in the field of health (namely ERIC, Web of Science, PubMed, and PsycINFO) to identify relevant papers, it is possible that the choice of keywords and database may have resulted in our omitting some relevant studies. Moreover, our review has focused on articles in international journals published in English, allowing us access to the most rigorous peer-reviewed studies and to those with greater international diffusion, given that English is the most frequently used language in the scientific environment: notwithstanding, this has also limited the scope of our review by precluding research published in other languages and contexts. Nor have documents that could have been found in the gray literature been included, given that only peer-reviewed studies have been considered for inclusion.

It is worth remembering moreover that most of the data on the outcomes of the studies included are self-reported, with mention of only occasional biological outcomes, which may limit the reliability of the effectiveness results. This represents another interesting reflection on the way in which the evaluation of the effectiveness of programs on sexual education is being carried out, and alerts us to the need for change.

Finally, it should be noted that this review of reviews is focused on adolescents from high-income countries, and our results show that studies carried out in the United States are largely overrepresented, since it is the country that provides the highest number of samples, especially in school settings: this may give rise to bias when it comes to generalizing from these results. Once again, this raises another necessary reflection on the capitalization that studies focused on American samples are having in the construction of the body of scientific knowledge on sexual and reproductive behavior, when in reality sexuality is conditioned by socio-economic variables that require a far-more multicultural and world-centric approach.

5. Conclusions

This review of reviews is the first to assess jointly the effectiveness of school-based, digital and blended learning interventions in ASRH in high-income countries. The effectiveness of the sex education programs reviewed mostly focused on the reduction of risky behaviors (e.g., STI or unwanted pregnancies) as public health outcomes; however, pleasure, desire and healthy relationships are outcomes that are mostly conspicuous by their absence in the reviews we have covered. Nonetheless, the broad range of studies included in this RoR, with their diversity of settings and methods, populations and objectives, precludes any easily drawn comparisons or conclusions. The inconsistent results and the high risk of bias reduce the conclusiveness of this review, so a more rigorous assessment of the effectivity of sexual education programs is pending and action needs to be taken to guarantee better and more rigorous evaluations, with sufficient human and financial resources. Schools and organizations need technical assistance to build the capacity for rigorous program planning, implementation and evaluation [ 98 ]. To this end, there are already examples of interesting proposals, such as that of the Working to Institutionalize Sex Education (WISE) Initiative, a privately funded effort to help public school districts develop and deliver comprehensive sexuality programs in the USA [ 99 ].

The extent of the risks of bias identified in the reviews and studies covered by this RoR points to an important conclusion, allowing us to highlight the precariousness that characterizes the evaluation of sexual education programs and the consequent undermining of public policy oriented to promoting ASRH. Public policies that promote ASRH are of vital importance when it comes to minimizing risks related to sexual behavior, and maximizing healthy relations and sexual well-being for the youngest members of our society.

Above all it is important to recognize the opportunities afforded by new technologies, so ubiquitous in the lives of young people, since they allow for programs that are far more cost-effective than traditional, in-person interventions. Finally, blended learning programs are perhaps even more promising, given their combination of the best of face-to-face and digital interventions, meaning they provide an excellent educative tool in the new context of the COVID-19 pandemic, and may even become the dominant teaching model in the future.

Flow diagram Preferred reporting items for systematic reviews and meta-analysis, PRISMA).

Search Terms Used.

Description of studies.

Characteristics and main results of the studies included.

Evaluation of the studies included (AMSTAR II).

1 1. Did the research questions and inclusion criteria for the review include the components of PCIO?; 2. Did the report of the review contain an explicit statement that the review methods were established prior to the conduct of the review and did the report justify any significant deviations from the protocol?; 3. Did the review authors explain their selection of the study designs for inclusion in the review?; 4. Did the review authors use a comprehensive literature search strategy?; 5. Did the review authors perform study selection in duplicate?; 6. Did the review authors perform data extraction in duplicate?; 7. Did the review authors provide a list of excluded studies and justify the exclusions?; 8. Did the review authors describe the included studies in adequate detail?; 9. Did the review authors use a satisfactory technique for assessing the risk of bias (RoB) in individual studies that were included in the review?; 10. Did the review authors report on the sources of funding for the studies included in the review?; 11. If meta-analysis was performed, did the review authors use appropriate methods for statistical combination of results?; 12. If meta-analysis was performed, did the review authors assess the potential impact of RoB in individual studies on the results of the meta-analysis or other evidence synthesis?; 13. Did the review authors account for RoB in primary studies when interpreting/discussing the results of the review?; 14. Did the review authors provide a satisfactory explanation for, and discussion of, any heterogeneity observed in the results of the review?; 15. If they performed quantitative synthesis did the review authors carry out an adequate investigation of publication bias (small study bias) and discuss its likely impact on the results of the review?; 16. Did the review authors report any potential sources of conflict of interest, including any funding they received for conducting the review? 2 H = Hight; M = Media; C = Low; CL = Critically Low. N = No; Y = Yes.

Author Contributions

Conceptualization, M.L.-F. and R.M.-R.; methodology, M.L.-F.; R.M.-R.; Y.R.-C. and M.V.C.-F.; formal analysis, M.L.-F.; R.M.-R.; Y.R.-C. and M.V.C.-F.; investigation, M.L.-F.; R.M.-R.; Y.R.-C. and M.V.C.-F.; writing—original draft preparation, M.L.-F. and R.M.-R.; writing—review and editing, M.L.-F.; R.M.-R., and Y.R.-C. and.; supervision, M.L.-F.; R.M.-R.; Y.R.-C. and M.V.C.-F. All authors have read and agreed to the published version of the manuscript.

This research received no external funding.

Institutional Review Board Statement

Not applicable.

Informed Consent Statement

Data availability statement, conflicts of interest.

The authors declare that they have no conflicts of interest.

Publisher’s Note: MDPI stays neutral with regard to jurisdictional claims in published maps and institutional affiliations.

EssayEmpire

Sexuality, gender, and education essay.

Sexuality, one of the central aspects of human existence, encompasses a range of expression that can vary by historical moment, culture, social or economic class, and even the individual. Its seeming fluidity and scope can make it difficult to comprehend. Closely connected with the notion of sexuality is gender. Gender is a set of stories people tell themselves and each other about what it means to be male and female. Like sexuality, stories about gender vary among individuals, cultures, and historical eras. As with any complex, socially created quality, individuals create and recreate their gender throughout their lives. Sexuality and gender are intimately intertwined concepts in the sense that gender assists individuals in navigating sexual choices, in helping them find others with whom sexual activity may be a possibility. This entry looks at the impact of sexuality and gender issues in education, providing both a brief overview and a more detailed look at the historical record.

Schools Take Responsibility

Perhaps because of the fluidity and possible variation in sexuality and gender expression, societies have endeavored to define norms that are maintained through rule creation and enforcement, individual and group vigilance, and language aimed at reinforcing notions of sexual and gender conformity. In the past, religious institutions, local communities, and extended families upheld the greatest portion of responsibility for maintaining sexuality and gender norms. As educational institutions, particularly tax-supported schools, proliferated, however, they bore ever-increasing responsibility for imparting normative sexuality and gender in youth. This shift in responsibility was most pronounced during full-scale industrialization of the economy, which had as an attendant consequence the greater involvement of parents in wage-earning work outside the home. Schools then assumed growing responsibilities for raising children to the degree that working parents declined it. Schools essentially became important agencies in defining and shaping sexuality and gender among youth.

The significant responsibility for maintaining normative sexuality and gender among youth has been carried out by schools ever since. This largely implicit work is embedded in virtually every aspect of schooling: who is hired to teach, how students and school workers may dress, what events—both curricular and extracurricular—might be organized, how students may behave with each other and with school staff, and what content constitutes the explicit curriculum. Because the regulation of sexuality and gender norms among youth so pervades the work of schooling and is so deeply enmeshed in its culture as well, members of school communities simply have assumed that this function always has existed and therefore is a natural part of the work of schools.

This ongoing assumption, which is akin to acceptance of the sexuality and gender regulating functions of schools, has continued until persons who transgress sexuality and gender norms have challenged that authority. Over the past half-century, persons who have defined themselves as lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, transsexual, intersexual, or, to use the broader but still contentious label, “queer,” have mounted challenges to the conventional sexuality and gender order of schools. At first, only a few school-workers with nonconforming sexuality and gender identities publicly stood up for their employment rights. Since then, not only have larger numbers of school-workers and their allies campaigned for improved conditions for queer-identified persons in schools, but so, too, have students. Over the past two decades in particular, students have played powerful and central roles in winning rights for sexuality and gender transgressors in schools.

These efforts have not succeeded easily. Rather, conservative countermovements have confronted sexuality and gender transgressors at every turn. As the mutability and variety of sexual and gender identities has been championed by growing numbers of persons, a backlash movement effectively has tempered this expansion, endeavoring to squeeze human sexuality and gender into a narrowly constrained, binary model. Within this model, room exists only for heterosexual behavior among persons with distinct, polarized gender identities aligned with supposed biological sex. The right-wing backlash movement has enjoyed significant political and social success over the past few decades by deploying strategies that include using emotionally laden language, casting all talk about sexuality and gender in starkly oppositional or binary terms, and essentially leaving out or ignoring the social complexities and nuances that complicate phenomena as deeply rooted as gender and sexuality.

Tracking the History

During recent skirmishes between sexuality and gender transgressing persons in schools and their conservative critics, as well as over the long-term past since the industrialization of our economy and compulsory school attendance, one of the fundamental means of influencing or regulating students’ sexuality and gender has been through hiring school-workers who might model acceptable sexuality and gender norms.

Early Schools

When coeducational common schooling spread during the mid-nineteenth century, schoolwork split neatly into two realms: administrative work performed primarily by men, and teaching, which quickly became women’s work. This division closely resembled the bifurcated responsibilities of men and women in conventional heterosexual households, with men exerting authority and representing family units in the external realm and women overseeing domestic affairs. Schools, then, essentially came to resemble the families whose services they had come to supplement. School principals, then later superintendents, performed manly work while teaching became feminized in the sense that it was acceptable mainly for women. This role segregation could not have been lost on students, who, no doubt, internalized this implicit and powerful message.

School-workers similarly modeled normative sexuality for their charges. When communities first employed teachers, they selected only single women whom they regarded as chaste paragons of virtue. Women who married were forced to resign. This prevented any conflicts they might experience in deciding where their primary allegiances might lie: with their husbands or male supervisors. At the same time, communities expressly sought married or marriageable men for school administrative positions. By heading a heterosexual household unit, these men defused any potential criticism of their sexuality, manliness, responsibility, character, or fidelity. Women and men in school work thus experienced expectations about their marital and sexual status that were directly inverted. In the end, when schools hired workers who manifested normative sexuality and gender, they wanted to ensure proper modeling for students. Eventually, schools would add curricula with the overt intent of shaping youth into acceptably heterosexual individuals who clearly demonstrated gender-normal qualities and who possessed a keen understanding of middle-class courtship rituals.

Despite persistent efforts to shape the sexuality and gender of students through modeling provided by school-workers, schools also have offered fascinating opportunities for supporting sexuality and gender transgression. A century ago, for instance, communities so feared the effects that a nearly completely female-dominated teaching force might wreak on students, particularly males, that they aggressively sought any men who might show the slightest interest in teaching or an ability to teach youth. They even were willing to hire men who fell outside the normative range of sexuality and gender. The women hired to teach sometimes also transgressed the bounds of normative sexuality. Schools primarily or exclusively hired only single women, which allowed large numbers of single women to live independently, if only modestly. Some single female teachers chose to live with other women, perhaps to share living expenses, but undoubtedly in some cases to center their lives on other women. Women who developed enduring romantic and/or sexual attachments to other women departed radically from conventional sexual mores requiring instead that they center their lives on men.

At first, when these historical moments fostered opportunities for transgressive sexuality and gender among school-workers, little public discussion ensued, especially if the ranks of school-workers could be maintained with reasonable quality and relatively low costs. Eventually, though, criticism mounted. Publicly expressed concerns focused not so much on school-workers in and of themselves, but on how students might be affected by such influences. Critics complained that spinster teachers encouraged girls to eschew marriage. Others argued that effete male school-workers exposed students to sexual abnormalities and infected them with deviant behaviors. Schools typically responded to such public complaint by scrutinizing the ranks of school workers and insisting on sexuality and gender conformity, and also by clamping down on the range of behaviors and expressions permitted of students. Schools, then, have both nurtured transgressive sexuality and gender, and, just as surely, endeavored to contain such transgressions.

Turn Of The Century

Such pressures to constrain sexuality and gender in schools gradually built over the first half of the twentieth century. One particularly powerful force was the suffrage-era backlash movement against women’s steady gains in social, economic, and political power. Teddy Roosevelt led the charge with his vehement protest that middle and owning-class White women as a group were abandoning their responsibilities to marry and bear children—that they essentially were committing “race suicide.” Because an overwhelming portion of the ranks of educated, middle-class, single women either were or had been teachers, spinster teachers found themselves in the crosshairs of such attacks. Making them even more suspect was the fact that many of the leaders and grassroots workers of the suffrage movement were single female teachers.

Along with these developments, the early decades of the twentieth century also brought increased public awareness of persons who transgressed sexuality and gender norms. Books documenting the scientific study of human sexuality, first published in Europe, reached bookshelves in the United States during these years. For the first time, elaborate detail demarcated lines between new classes of sexual beings and behaviors, including “homosexuals,” “inverts,” “intersexuals,” and so on. Much of this early sexology research pathologized persons who transgressed sexuality and/or gender norms. The rapid spread of interest in the young field of psychology also fueled public discussion of a range of sexual identities, behaviors, desires, and neuroses as translations of Freud’s works became widely available. In time, scholarly discussion of human sexuality and gender gave way to portrayals in popular media. Newspapers began reporting police busts of known enclaves of individuals seeking sexual experiences with others of the same sex. Artists, writers, and movie-makers featured characters with explicitly transgressive sexuality and gender until Hollywood production codes imposed in the early 1930s drove such depictions into the shadows.

As language describing homosexuals increasingly appeared in newspapers, books, magazines, and films, public awareness of their existence also grew. However, popular understanding of homosexuality easily crossed any boundaries that may have existed between sexuality and gender. To many, same-sex desire connoted gender transgression. Women who defied gender norms and worked in the public sphere or asserted their rights could be regarded as sexually deviant, or lesbian. During the 1930s and 1940s, the popular image of the spinster teacher shifted away from that of peculiar individuals devoted to public service and toward one of sexual suspicion. School systems largely retained this increasingly tainted pool of workers, though, because single female teachers provided devoted and skillful service at little cost.

A New Teaching Cadre

However, when new categories of potential teachers appeared after World War II, namely married women and veterans, school districts quickly dropped their long-standing practice of hiring only single female teachers. Married women not only entered teaching in significant numbers during these years, but their representation in the classroom quickly outstripped that of single women. In fact, the proportion of married to single teachers rose sharply higher than the proportion of women in the general workforce. School officials, eager to rid their personnel of the taint of deviance, contributed to the postwar trend where teaching radically shifted to work for married women after having been spinsters’ work for more than a century.

If the years before World War II brought growing awareness of persons who desired others of the same sex, the years after produced outright fear, dramatic headlines, and nationwide efforts to stem this supposedly rising threat. The armed forces, in efforts to downsize after the war, identified and purged suspected homosexuals from their ranks. In the Cold War hunt for enemies in our midst, Senator Joseph McCarthy temporarily wielded enormous power by launching widely publicized hunts for communists in government; but after finding few, if any, he switched to a somewhat easier target: homosexuals. His efforts garnered national media attention and inspired similar efforts by state and local governmental agencies.

Then, a popular magazine in 1950 published what it called a groundbreaking piece of journalism describing the threat purportedly posed by homosexual teachers. The article, which opened by celebrating the work of Senator McCarthy, charged that “the homosexual is an inveterate seducer of the young of both sexes, and … presents a social problem because he is not content with being degenerate himself; he must have degenerate companions, and is ever seeking younger victims” (Major, 1950, p. 100). The author conveyed the impression that, as Senator McCarthy charged, homosexuality spread like a contagious disease, that youth were unable to resist its lures, and that homosexuals wanted nothing more than to corrupt as many youth as possible.

School officials rapidly responded by examining their personnel rosters for individuals with supposedly homosexual tendencies who might corrupt students by association or, worse, actively prey on them. School administrators examined male applicants for effeminacy, which seemed to connote homosexuality according to popular understanding that conflated same-sex desire with gender transgression. They inspected women, too, to ensure properly feminine attire; the presence of wedding or engagement rings; and commitment to upstanding, heterosexually oriented social activities.

Local and state education agencies pressed the matter further as well. California legislators enacted a law requiring local police to notify school officials whenever they caught teachers in sting operations aimed at snaring homosexuals. These teachers invariably lost their jobs regardless of the outcome of legal action based on such charges. Some investigators, having assisted McCarthy in finding and purging homosexuals from federal offices, traveled to Boise, Idaho, to investigate the existence of a supposed homosexual ring. Interrogations, stakeouts, intimidation, and campaigns of public humiliation were meted out as investigators spared no effort to find teachers and others who were rumored to prey on boys, even though few were ever found guilty.

The Florida legislature would not be outdone. In the late 1950s, a special committee, which initially sought to investigate the activities of civil rights workers and then communists but failed to find or successfully prosecute any, then moved on to identify and purge the state’s teaching force of homosexuals. Because of the national media attention netted by each of these campaigns and others, school-workers learned that they needed to conceal any trace of gender-transgressing behavior or appearance because these supposedly hinted at homosexuality. Once any teacher was suspected of homosexuality, regardless of the truthfulness or relevance of such a charge, she or he usually was summarily dismissed with little recourse.

Tolerated Scrutiny

For years, school-workers tolerated the heightened scrutiny faced by the profession. Licensed educators were particularly vulnerable because of their close association with young people and an ongoing supposition in the minds of many linking homosexuality with pedophilia. This supposition, largely trumped up by McCarthy and others who followed in his footsteps, was the notion that homosexuals, like Cold War enemies, would take over if only given a foothold. As Americans were warned to be ever vigilant about the supposed threat from within of communists, so, too, was the public admonished to be wary of gender-transgressing teachers who might convert the next generation into “practicing homosexuals.” These threats typically were accompanied by untraceable anecdotal evidence and high-flying rhetoric rather than verifiable facts.

School-workers mostly endured these conditions. Those who desired others of the same sex or who wished to transgress gender norms knew that retaining their jobs required acquiescence. However, with the rise in the late 1960s and early 1970s of a full-fledged, grassroots gay liberation movement, conditions for school-workers slowly began to change. The Stonewall Rebellion, during which patrons of a gay bar in Greenwich Village openly and brazenly resisted police harassment in a three-day riot, sparked a collective shift in consciousness among self-identified gay men and lesbians. The movement was born as individuals decided to stand up against the oppression directed at them for so long.

Some teachers who desired persons of the same sex and/or who transgressed gender bounds joined the many activist organizations that proliferated in the years after Stonewall, in the process learning the politics of gay liberation. Eventually, lesbian, gay, bisexual, and then transgender school-workers formed their own associations. Such LGBT organizations appeared in New York, Chicago, San Francisco, Los Angeles, Denver, and Boston, among other cities, during the mid-1970s. Organizers sought to provide social support to members as well as to engage in activities to increase their collective visibility and employment rights. Virtually all of these LGBT school-worker associations marched in local gay pride parades, an act that flew directly in the face of the requirement that they be invisible. They began to fight back when school administrators sought to fire or demote them on account of their status. They brought employment discrimination lawsuits and staged media events designed to highlight their plight. And they successfully leveraged their growing clout into policy shifts by larger teacher associations, even, in time, the National Education Association and American Federation of Teachers, both of which went on record as supporting the employment rights of teachers regardless of their sexual orientation.

Gay Liberation

The larger gay liberation movement scored some impressive early political victories as several metropolitan areas passed nondiscrimination ordinances protecting individuals against discrimination in housing and employment on account of sexual orientation. However, in time, the growing visibility, flamboyance, and political power of the fledgling gay movement would trigger a vigorous backlash. That backlash specifically would target the most vulnerable members of the LGBT community: those who worked with youth, especially teachers, because of an imagined threat of child molestation or their “homosexual influence.” Such fears were confirmed in a nationwide poll conducted in 1977 that found that although most believed homosexuals should enjoy freedom from employment discrimination, this belief did not extend to school-workers. In fact, 65 percent objected to the presence of homosexual elementary teachers.

It was at this moment that Anita Bryant, the former Miss America and singer for evangelical ministries, took on as her mission the elimination of homosexuals in school employment. She rallied fellow conservative Christians in the Miami-Dade area to overturn a new nondiscrimination ordinance offering protection against employment and housing discrimination on account of sexual orientation. She attacked the ordinance not by going after all members of the LGBT community, however, but by narrowing her focus strictly to school workers. She appeared on nationally syndicated conservative Christian television shows such as the PTL Club and 700 Club, arguing that the presence of homosexual teachers would encourage more pupils to become homosexuals, that youth may come to regard it as an acceptable lifestyle, that children might begin to cross gender-appropriate bounds, and that such teachers would molest children. She triggered public outrage when she conjured the spectacle of male teachers wearing skirts or cavorting with children. Initially, gay liberation activists ignored Bryant, writing her off as a second-rate performer with limited social impact. When Bryant’s campaign to “Save Our Children” started receiving hundreds of thousands of checks from around the country, though, her growing political might became clear. Even though polls indicated that the majority of Miami-Dade voters supported retaining the ordinance, most supporters failed to show up to vote. In contrast, busloads of Bryant’s supporters poured into polling places, eventually scoring a lopsided 2 to 1 victory and bringing the ordinance down.

Among those attending Bryant’s victory party was John Briggs, a California state legislator with gubernatorial ambitions. Briggs jubilantly told a reporter that night that he would capitalize on this political groundswell by launching a referendum aimed at ridding schools of homosexuals. He described how this campaign would ignite his quest for the governorship. Shortly afterward, he succeeded in obtaining enough signatures to place the referendum on the ballot, partly with the help of Bryant, who flew to California to assist. Proposition 6, as it came to be known, would have required school districts to rid their ranks of any employees who either were lesbian or gay or who supported the employment rights of those who were. The referendum read:

The state finds a compelling interest in refusing to employ and in terminating the employment of a schoolteacher, a teacher’s aide, a school administrator or a counselor, subject to reasonable restrictions and qualifications who engages in public homosexual activity and/or public homosexual conduct directed at, or likely to come to the attention of, schoolchildren or other school employees. This proscription is essential since such activity and conduct undermines that state’s interest in preserving and perpetuating the conjugal family unit.

Proposition 6 captured national headlines as it highlighted a showdown between a new and vigorous lesbian and gay rights movement, on one hand, and religious/political conservatives on the other. Although Proposition 6 particularly focused on school-workers, grassroots lesbian and gay rights workers understood it as a much broader attack on the larger movement. Lesbian and gay school-workers (and their allies) needed the assistance of activists across the movement because they were quite vulnerable themselves: If they openly campaigned against Proposition 6 and it passed, then they would lose their jobs. Nonetheless, many lesbian and gay teachers risked their chosen profession by coming out and working hard to defeat the referendum. Soon, labor, coalitions of persons of color, women’s liberation activists, and others joined them. Engaging in this work proved daunting in other ways, though. Although volunteers eagerly signed on to help, most felt safe giving only their first names. Because campaign contributions over $50 required public reporting, the movement received large numbers of contributions of $49. Fund-raising events, including high-profile celebrity fetes, quickly dissipated when media cameras arrived. Despite these challenges, momentum to defeat Proposition 6 increased steadily, culminating in a decisive victory for lesbian and gay movement activists.

Renewed Backlash

The conservative backlash, if temporarily slowed, did not abate, however. Through the remainder of the 1970s and into the 1980s, a wide variety of local, state, and national groups sought to resist the larger lesbian and gay rights movement by concentrating their political efforts on ridding schools of visible LGBT persons. Oklahoma legislators resoundingly passed a law similar to Proposition 6. However, this law eventually was struck down when the Supreme Court deadlocked on the case. Legislation introduced in Missouri would have required all lesbians and gay men who worked with youth under 21 years old to be listed on a Division of Health registry, which would be consulted for personnel decisions. All of the conservative efforts such as these had in common at least two assumptions: Lesbian and gay school-workers would, through their influence, make children transgress the bounds of sexuality or gender norms; and lesbian and gay school-workers were thought highly likely to molest students, even though this assumption could not be substantiated with evidence. In fact, evidence consistently indicated instead that lesbian and gay school-workers were less likely to molest children than heterosexual men.

Around this time, the AIDS pandemic first emerged in national reporting. AIDS, which in the United States quickly became known as a disease that disproportionately afflicted gay men, caused public alarm. Communities feared the presence in schools of anyone infected with the virus, which translated into a fear of gay male school-workers. Soon, though, it became clear that AIDS might directly affect youth who became sexually active while possessing minimal knowledge of the dangers. Ignoring the existence of gay, lesbian, and bisexual youth became equated in the minds of concerned school-workers and parents with simply allowing such youth to die. Furthermore, school communities increasingly became mindful of the plight of sexuality and/or gender nonconforming or queer youth, who claimed their identities at ever younger ages and who typically faced brutal emotional and physical abuse at the hands of their peers at school. School-workers and parents learned about the profound self-loathing experienced by some, but certainly not all, queer youth and their particularly difficult transitions to adulthood. The NEA Delegate Assembly decided in 1988 to support youth counseling programs geared toward helping queer youth accept and adjust to their same-sex desires. This development stood in stark contrast with the then-prevailing practice of counseling such youth to become heterosexual, or even committing them to programs or institutions aimed at ensuring their heterosexuality. A few model LGBT affirming counseling programs emerged soon afterward, most notably Project 10, started by Los Angeles counselor Virginia Uribe.

Efforts to ensure the welfare of queer youth received explosive growth of support in 1991 with the release of a federal report describing alarmingly high suicide rates among lesbian and gay youth. The report, initially withheld from public release for years because of conservative political concern about its findings, declared that

A majority of suicide attempts by homosexuals occur during their youth, and gay youth are 2 to 3 times more likely to attempt suicide than other young people. They may comprise up to 30 percent of completed youth suicides annually. .. Schools need to include information about homosexuality in their curriculum and protect gay youth from abuse by peers to ensure they receive an equal education. Helping professionals need to accept and support a homosexual orientation in youth. Social services need to be developed that are sensitive to and reflective of the needs of gay and lesbian youth. (Gibson, 1989, p. 110)

The eventual release of the youth suicide report triggered strong responses from both the political left and right. LGBT rights activists and their allies contended that the report demonstrated the necessity of attending to the unique concerns of LGBT youth that, at root, schools must foster a climate of acceptance and support for LGBT persons. No doubt, some activists found that working on behalf of youth was considerably less controversial than seeking rights for school-workers, whom the public still regarded with suspicion. On the political and religious right, however, critics charged that the report contained erroneous data that exaggerated the phenomenon of high suicide rates among LGBT youth. They fundamentally questioned the purpose of any counseling that led to acceptance of same-sex desires or gender transgression, arguing instead that such youth needed skillful counseling geared toward making them heterosexual, gender-conforming adults. Furthermore, they contended that any tax-supported programs encouraging acceptance of LGBT persons directly conflicted with their religious values, which held that homosexuality was a sin.

The LGBT Movement

As adults across the political and religious spectrum debated, growing numbers of students who identified as LGBT or queer decided to take matters into their own hands. The first gay–straight student alliance was formed in 1989 in Massachusetts with the sponsorship of Kevin Jennings, a gay teacher in an independent school who later led in the formation of the Gay, Lesbian and Straight Education Network. Gay–straight alliances in schools endeavored to bring queer and allied youth together with supportive adults in an effort to improve school climate for all queer persons. Led largely by student initiative, the movement to establish gay–straight alliances in schools spread with astonishing speed, growing to more than 900 such groups within the first decade—and the pace of growth shows no signs of slackening. In Massachusetts, one of the earliest coordinated efforts across gay–straight alliances was a statewide lobby day in 1993 where queer and allied youth traveled to the capital to convince legislators that a state law was necessary for the elimination of discrimination against queer youth in schools. Their lobbying succeeded, and not only did lawmakers enact protections for queer youth in schools, but they also allocated funds to create and offer training programs to help members of school communities respect their queer members.

Despite these early and impressive successes, students usually confronted stark and overwhelming resistance. When Kelli Petersen organized a gay– straight alliance in her Salt Lake City high school, the state legislature responded by passing a law requiring schools to forbid student clubs that discussed issues related to sexuality. Petersen, undaunted, continued her activism to secure the creation of her high school’s gay–straight alliance and, in the process, attracted considerable national attention and support. Eventually, Petersen’s principal resisted the authority of school board members—and state legislators—by not only supporting the gay–straight alliance, but also enacting policies protecting queer youth from discrimination. And finally, in a precedent-setting court decision, Jamie Nabozny won a million-dollar judgment against his former school administrators who either did nothing or even encouraged homophobic verbal and painful physical abuse against him when he was a student. School districts around the country took notice and immediately began studying how to address the issue of LGBT discrimination against students so that they might avoid similar legal judgments.

The Current Situation

Although concern about sexuality and gender transgression in schools centered on school-workers for most of the twentieth century, more recently, self-identified queer students and their allies have recentered discussions and taken up the cause of winning rights for queer persons in schools. This may be in part because the larger queer-rights movement has shifted from the margins to the mainstream and, in the process, increased awareness of queer issues. Students may recognize and claim queer identities at earlier ages than in the past. Queer youth also may have organized their own support networks because queer adults largely have been reluctant to assist them, mainly out of concern that their efforts would be viewed as predatory.

The old stereotype of queer adults as child molesters dies hard even though evidence repeatedly has refuted it. Through the 1990s and early twenty-first century, queer youth also have enjoyed new means of connecting with each other electronically and thereby resisting what previously had been an inherently isolating experience. They have forged vibrant new forms of culture and actively insisted on determining their own individual and collective identities rather than passively accepting identities foisted on them by others, such as the early 1990s stereotype of the helpless, hopeless suicidal gay youth. Queer youth, then, are on the front lines of the ongoing effort to make schools safe places for all people.

Bibliography:

• Blount, J. (2005). Fit to teach: Same-sex desire, gender, and school work in the twentieth century. Albany: State University of New York Press.
• Gibson, P. (1989). Gay male and lesbian youth suicide. Report of the Secretary’s Task Force on Youth Suicide, Vol. 3. Washington, DC: Department of Health and Human Services.
• Harbeck, K. (1997). Gay and lesbian educators: Personal freedoms, public constraints. Malden, MA: Amethyst.
• Irvine, J. M. (2002). Talk about sex: The battles over sex education in the United States. Berkeley: University of California Press.
• Lipkin, A. (1999). Understanding homosexuality, changing schools: A text for teachers, counselors, and administrators. Boulder, CO: Westview.
• Major, R. H. (1950, September). The new moral menace to our youth. Coronet, pp. 100–108.
• Moran, J. P. (2000). Teaching sex: The shaping of adolescence in the 20th century. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.
• Rofes, E. (2005). A radical rethinking of sexuality and schooling: Status quo or status queer. New York: Rowman & Littlefield.
• Sears, J. (Ed.). (2005). Youth, education, and sexualities. Westport, CT: Greenwood.

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