While the question of consent resurfaced at the time of the Mazan rape trial, the debate around sex life education in schools has also been relaunched. The law provides for education, but it is not applied. The government says it wants this to change.
“It’s time” that sex life education be “effective”. Thursday September 26, the new Secretary of State for Gender Equality, Salima Saa called for “move from lament to action”concerning education in emotional, relational and sexual life, compulsory since 2001 in schools. “The 2001 law lays interesting foundations, but it is still not applied”she judged during a Family Planning press conference in Paris.
Since 2001, sex education has been enshrined in law. Article 312-16 of the Education Code provides that a “Information and sexuality education are provided in schools, colleges and high schools at least three sessions per year and by homogeneous age groups.” This article states that “These sessions present an egalitarian vision of relationships between women and men. They contribute to learning about the respect due to the human body and raise awareness of sexist or sexual violence as well as female sexual mutilation.”
This text “does not, however, give any details on the conditions of organization of these sessions”, indicates a report from the General Inspectorate of Education submitted to the minister in July 2021. Several circulars have supplemented this law, the last dating from 2018, but the report describes them as “complex” and points at the end “a regulatory and operational framework for sexuality education that lacks clarity”.
Thus, despite the law, figures show that sex education remains little taught in schools. “It is clear that many students go through their schooling without having benefited from a single EAS session”writes the report of the General Inspectorate of Education. “Less than 15% of students benefit from three EAS sessions during the school year in school and high school”note the rapporteurs.
So how can we explain this delay in this area? For Bruno Bobkiewicz, principal and secretary general of SNPDEN-Unsa, “one of the difficulties is the transversal side of the theme which means that there is an orientation which is given, a national will shared by the educational community, but as the entire subject is not in the program of lessons, potentially, you can go through this theme”.
“A possible development would be the integration of this subject, globally, completely, into the programs.”
Bruno Bobkiewicz, SNPDEN-Unsaat franceinfo
Guislaine David, joint general secretary of FSU-Snuipp, the first primary school union, explains that “programs have just been rewritten on education for emotional, relational and sexual life, in which we participated, and which could make it possible to have effective teaching with our young students, but they have not seen the light of day, they were not published in the Higher Council of Education and therefore they are currently not in place.”
Teachers therefore demand proper programs, but sex education “must obviously involve staff training”, also warns Bruno Bobkiewicz. To date, training already exists in this area, but “which are often done on a voluntary basis, it is not systematic”, specifies the principal.
These are two of the 35 recommendations drawn up by the General Inspectorate of Education to advance this teaching: “Introduce the notions of sexuality education into the official programs of certain disciplines concerned, beyond the disciplines linked to biological and health aspects and moral and civic education” And “strengthen the deployment of academic trainers on sexuality education, in order to train in the long term all teaching, education, management and inspection staff”.
Can we also cite a reluctance on the part of teachers to approach this subject? “I don’t think there is any reluctance. This subject requires sufficient grounding on the part of those who raise it. We must prepare staff for reactions, for questions, for opposition”he believes, “there is a potential lack of knowledge of the subject and some teachers in certain disciplines may not feel sufficiently equipped to do so.”
Guislaine David, from FSU-Snuipp, confirms the need to train teachers.
“Myself, in initial training, I was never trained on these questions. And if I had had to deal with these questions from the start of my career I would have been in difficulty.”
Guislaine David, FSU-Snuippat franceinfo
“I did it from the moment I was sufficiently trained and unfortunately I had to train myself and it is also because I had children that I asked myself these questions “confides the trade unionist who also taught CM2 classes for a long time.
In an opinion delivered on September 10, the Economic, Social and Environmental Council (Cese) also pointed out the “lack of political support partly due to a certain reluctance on the part of public authorities who wish to avoid controversies”. A petition from the SOS Education association, entitled “At school, teach me divisions, not ejaculation!”, is currently circulating on social networks and has already collected more than 70,000 signatures for “demand a ban on sexuality education provided to children under 12”.
“It’s becoming more and more burdensome in our practices”testifies Guislaine David, who deplores “a reactionary vision of teaching with a withdrawal into oneself among parents who consider that they should not talk to their child about sex or love life”. The trade unionist also denounces the spread of false information. “This is something that had already existed under the ministry of Najat Vallaud-Belkacem with the ABCDs of equality, we even had parents who had withdrawn their child from school because teachers were accused of teaching masturbation to kindergarten children”, she recalls. “And then there is above all a desire that we not talk to children about this, to think that it is their responsibility, when it is the responsibility of society and not the full and complete responsibility parents.” Bruno Bobkiewicz, secretary general of SNPDEN-Unsa, agrees: “The school has its share of responsibility on societal issues, systematically.”
“We have a strong educational role, now it cannot replace the role of parents, that is the idea of co-education”.
Bruno Bobkiewicz, SNPDEN-Unsaat franceinfo
The report from the General Inspectorate of Education is nevertheless optimistic about the positioning of parents. “In the first level, when the EAS project is presented to parents in the school council with an explanation of the concepts and contents and the educational objectives, there is support from the parents, especially since the word sexuality is not not pronounced”, evoking “parents generally confident and reassured by the management of EAS at school.”