Eggen discusses sexual consent at curriculum event
The province is moving forward with roundtable discussions on wellness and sexual health as it conducts a review of the school curriculum.
Education Minister David Eggen was in Calgary on Friday for a discussion with representatives from across the province from various areas, including the Centre for Sexuality and Pro Bono Students Canada’s University of Calgary branch.
The discussions are part of the province’s $64.4 million review and overhaul of the K-12 curriculum.
“I think this is a great opportunity for us to build a wellness and sexual (health) education curriculum that will meet the needs of students,” said Eggen during the meeting.
“My priority is first and foremost to ensure safety, that consent is taught as a safe mechanism for people to know the idea of respect and confidence, and that we are following through with our responsibilities in regards to public health.”
A large aspect of the new curriculum will include lessons about sexual consent.
“We see around the MeToo movement and so forth, there’s a real appetite and need, I think, to create a safer society around health and wellness and sexuality, and we believe this is a great opportunity to do so,” said Eggen.
For example, Eggen said, teaching boys at a young age what is appropriate and inappropriate is “foundational for the rest of their lives, to make sure they are respectful to others in both physical and social interactions.”
Pam Krause, president and CEO of the Centre of Sexuality, said the
curriculum change is “long overdue.”
“We’re looking forward to having integrated curriculum and we really feel that wellness is really important, because it looks at the whole person,” said Krause.
“The issue of consent is something that is certainly more prominent now, but systematically, has been a problem for a long, long time. So again, that this government would take on and be willing to add consent into the curriculum and have it embedded into the wellness throughout K-12 I think is also really important.”
Sasha Best, former project leader of the consent project run through Pro Bono Students Canada’s University of Calgary branch, has presented interactive consent education to students in grades 9 through 12.
Best said she believes something that is often missed when holding conversations about consent, is that they need to be held in an accessible way, that doesn’t go over the heads of the people they’re speaking to. “I just think it could have some really positive outcomes,” said Best.
“I’m so happy to see the (province) is considering involving the (consent project) in the curriculum, and I just hope that through the consent project, we can speak to what are some ways that are working with children and working with young people to talk about this issue in a way that they can understand.”
The wellness and sexual health aspect of the curriculum would be mainly taught in a wellness class, but Eggen said they are also looking at cross-curricular options.