To be, or not to be, consulted?

The future for NZ parents having a say about the content of RSE lessons.

Something to add to your pre-Christmas to-do list is to submit on the proposed changes to the consultation requirements for relationships and sexuality education (RSE). Currently, by law, schools must consult with their communities every two years about the content of their RSE lessons but as part of the Education and Training (System Reform) Amendment Bill, currently before parliament, community consultation is to be axed.

Public submissions are open until January 14 but who wants to be writing submissions in the holiday season - so add it to your list and get it done this week!

The background

In 2024, the Education Review Office was commissioned to write a report about the state of RSE in NZ schools. ERO found there was inconsistent teaching of RSE, and that finally prompted the Minister to initiate the writing of a new curriculum. Read RGE’s response to the ERO report here and our cautious optimism for the new curriculum here.

As part of its review, ERO investigated how well schools were carrying out the community consultation and reported that most schools were meeting the requirement but, astoundingly:

• 28% of schools didn’t know they were required to consult (!)

• 20% of board chairs didn’t know when their school’s last consultation had occurred; and

• 8% of board chairs said that the last consultation had been more than two years before.

Clearly, the law is not working as it should. ERO also reported that some schools found the consultation hard to manage, with instances of heated meetings and division in the community putting extra stress on school staff.

Not reported by ERO were the many examples of parents being treated with disdain when they ask for information about RSE. Schools often falsely claim they cannot share lesson plans for copyright reasons. Some require parents to go into the school to view physical copies of the resources. Despite parental objections, some have continued to teach the falsehood that humans can choose their sex. It is not surprising that emotions might run high at community meetings.

The solution that ERO suggested was that the requirement to consult with the community be replaced by a requirement to inform them.

At the time, RGE said:

There may be some merit in schools providing information rather than consultation, but that hinges entirely on whether or not the content of the new curriculum is controversial and also on whether schools can communicate with parents more effectively than they have in the past.

The proposal

The Education and Training (System Reform) Amendment Bill was introduced to parliament on 20 October. It covers several different reforms in the education sector but the part we are interested in is Section 51 of the Act in which the current consultation will be replaced by a requirement for schools to regularly inform their communities on the RSE curriculum and its delivery. Parents will retain the right to withdraw their children from the lessons.

In its Regulatory Impact Statement, the Ministry of Education refers to the ERO report that “noted the increasingly divided views on sensitive topics and that achieving consensus is frequently difficult.” The Ministry considers that the draft changes to the curriculum have made consultation redundant.

The current requirement for schools to consult, at least once every two years, is no longer needed. With the shift to a knowledge-rich curriculum, schools and kura will be clear about what needs to be learnt, and how the health curriculum is to be taught, learnt, and assessed. The shift to greater detail and consistency means that schools and school communities will have less ability to influence health curriculum delivery.

The Ministry expects that schools will benefit by having more time to focus on delivering the curriculum and parents will get better health curriculum-related information.

RGE’s submission

As we stated at the time of the ERO report, whether providing information is better than consultation depends on the content of the curriculum and whether schools will drastically improve their communication.

On the first point, the new RSE curriculum has been released and is completely free of gender ideology, meaning the two-yearly consultation is no longer so vital. Another point to consider is that, if consultation is maintained, a small group of trans activists would still have the opportunity to pressure a school into including gender ideology again.

What is and must be retained is the right of parents to withdraw their child from the lessons if they wish. This right is only meaningful if parents have high quality information on which to base their decision.

RGE’s submission will say that parents must have full and transparent information about the content of each lesson, including worksheets, videos, posters, discussion topics and scripts that will be used.

RGE will also suggest that a national, standard workbook for RSE be produced and distributed to all schools so there is uniformity in lesson content across the country.

Full transparency about lesson content will mean activist teachers will not be able to reintroduce gender identity beliefs on the sly. If you support this idea, please say so in your submission which can be made by clicking this link.

While you’re at your keyboard

RGE’s Australian sister organisation, Active Watchful Waiting, was so disturbed by the content of a Gender Minorities Aotearoa document that is linked to on the NZ Police website, that it wrote to the Police Commissioner asking for its withdrawal.

The GMA “Anti-transgender Extremism Guide” likens those who oppose gender ideology to white supremacists and fascists and asserts that “elderly cisgender women commonly physically attack trans people.”

Here is AWWA’s critique of the GMA document.

Here is AWWA’s letter to the Police Commissioner.

Please add your voice to AWWA’s call for this extremist document to be removed by writing to the Police Commissioner at richard.chambers@police.govt.nz and to the Minister of Police, Mark Mitchell at m.mitchell@ministers.govt.nz

And another thing…

PATHA is seeking an injunction to stop the government’s ban on new prescriptions of puberty blockers. That organisation is no more than a lobby group for extreme body modification, as evidenced by its latest “Gender Affirming Care Guidelines” in which there are eight pages of advice on how to give cross sex hormones to children as young as ten. RGE critiqued the Guidelines here.

Please write to the Minister of Health (s.brown@ministers.govt.nz) to express your support for the puberty blocker restrictions and your alarm at PATHA’s unabashed endorsement of providing sterilising drugs for children.

By Fern Hickson