BY TIFFANY FORBES

Putting a condom on a banana and learning about the detriment of teen pregnancy is as far as Australian sex education extends, according to highschoolers nation-wide who believe the curriculum is failing them. 

A study conducted in 2020 revealed more than half of the students surveyed considered their relationship and sex education not useful, or irrelevant. This was due to factors such as too much or too little specificity, lack of LGBTQI+ content, or religious teaching that was incompatible with students' own beliefs.

This has prompted calls for a total upheaval of the current sex education system and new guidelines to be set to cater for a more inclusive, streamlined and sex-positive focus in Australian schools.

Carey Baptist Grammar graduate Steph Andrews, 22, said “it’s shocking to believe sex education is still lacking so much in 2021”.

Ms Andrews said she only received a few one-hour classes on contraception and STDs during year eight.

“The teaching [is] inconsistent, the teachers are not comfortable delivering the information and the topics are just so outdated," she said.

Ms Andrews said the curriculum did not engage at all with LGBTQI+ material, nor did it cover foreplay, sexting or how to ask for and give consent. These are themes she said she wished she had received more information about as a teen. 

As a result Ms Andrews, like many other students, has had to search online to develop the bulk of her sex education knowledge.

“I literally had to teach myself most of the stuff I know today about sex, which meant I often turned to experts on Instagram,” she said. 

“I remember being 20-years-old and only finding out what the clit was through an Instagram post, which is crazy considering how vital it is to female pleasure.” 

Australian sexologist Georgia Grace said the reason sex education is not meeting student needs is because it continues to cover sex in a negative way.

“The education that most people receive is sex-negative — ‘don’t have sex because it’s wrong, don’t have sex because you’ll get pregnant, don’t have sex because you’ll catch a disease’.”

According to Ms Grace, framing sex in a negative light from an early age goes on to influence young adults later in life, contributing to a sense of sexual shame or sexual fear. 

“I work with many adults who don't know much about their genitals, and as a result, they don't know how to stimulate them,” Ms Grace said.

“They don't know how to ask for what they want. They feel numb or disconnected to these parts of their bodies. 

“That’s why knowledge is power, and that starts in schools.” 

Another major issue when it comes to sex education in schools is that the curriculum is unclear. As a result, it is not consistent from classroom to classroom. 

This is evident in the same 2020 survey where results indicate there were many differences in what students reported learning from their relationship and sex education. 

Sex education facilitator Lauren French who works with Body Safety Australia to teach relationship and sex education in schools said the problem lies in the fact that the entire sex education curriculum is “a grey area” with little clarification, making it difficult for educators.

“The wording is so vague — some schools might do road safety instead of sex education because it's still considered ‘body safety’,” Ms French said. 

“Relationship education then might be about bullying rather than romance.” 

So, what needs to change to ensure Australian teens receive the information they need to be better-equipped at partaking in sexual relations?

According to Ms Grace, “we need to shift the sex education focus to encompass a pleasure-positive lens”.

This would involve learning and understanding the complete anatomy of genitalia and, in turn, how bodies feel pleasure and how pleasure should be communicated with a partner. 

“This focus shifts sex from being viewed as a negative, sinful or dangerous act, and rather prioritises the idea that sex can also be a really great human experience,” Ms Grace said. 

Pleasure-positive sex education also looks beyond simply penetration and promotes other types of stimulation, which can be just as important. 

A 2021 report commissioned by global fem-tech brand Smile Makers indicated that 73 per cent of women who received pleasure-positive sex education said they knew their body well. This compares to a mere 54 per cent amongst the women who were not afforded the same pleasure-centred information.

Four in five respondents who had received pleasure-positive sex education also revealed they were sexually satisfied, compared to only half of those who had received traditional sex education.

Scandinavian sex education models have found that information disseminated in a sex-positive way through discussions about orgasms, healthy relationships, communication and pleasure directly correlates with better health outcomes. 

“Studies show these students are less likely to coerce others or be coerced into unwanted sex, there's less teen pregnancy, they're waiting longer, or they wait until they're older to have sex,” Ms Grace said.

As an educator who works first-hand with Australian students, Ms French said that simply telling young people not to have sex is not the answer and often results in unsafe sexual outcomes.

“When you actually give your students a pleasure-positive understanding of their bodies and others’, but not in a terrifying way, they're much better at doing their own risk assessment rather than having to rely on 'no' information,” she said.

However, both experts agreed that age and maturity was an important factor to consider and pleasure-positive classes should be taught with this in mind. 

“There’s obviously a conversation to be had about age-appropriate information and individual appropriate information because maturity level is not always identical, so keeping this at the forefront when teaching is key,” Ms French said.