Educator notes

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When teaching Relationships and Sexuality Education in schools, it is important to recognise the diversity in the range and variation of people’s gender identity and sexual identity. Teachers need to ensure that lessons cater for all students including those who do not identify as heterosexual and cisgender.

It is common for people to confuse sex, gender, gender identity and sexual identity, but they are all very different things.

(See also: Sexual Diversity. This offers information on how to support students of all sexual identities including those who do not identify as heterosexual. See also: Intersex Variations.)

Gender roles (how we expect girls and boys to behave) are taught right from birth and influence all of us - what we wear, how we behave, what interests we have, how we feel about ourselves, and how we relate to one another.

Roles, responsibilities and expectations are learned from family, friends, communities, opinion leaders, religious institutions, schools, the workplaces, advertising and media. They are also influenced by custom, law, class, ethnicity, and individual or institutional bias.

Restricting what people can and can't do based on gender stereotypes only limits what they can achieve. We want to maximise our students' potential.

Gender stereotypes can limit people's potential, shape their career prospects, get in the way of good mental health and respectful relationships. Research shows the links between rigid gender stereotypes, gender inequality and violence against women and children.¹ 

Enlisting the help of others within the community can benefit and value-add to your school/classroom program. However, before inviting a guest speaker to your school, ensure that you know exactly what you want to gain by having the guest speaker. Regardless of the topic being addressed, a 'one off' isolated presentation can have little impact on a students' health behaviour.

Growing and Developing Healthy Relationships (GDHR) strongly promotes and advocates the Health Promoting Schools Framework (HPSF) as a way of supporting a comprehensive approach to improving Relationships and Sexuality Education (RSE) outcomes.

Information for parents and teachers on the human pappilomavirus vaccine which is administered to students in Year 7

• The human papillomavirus (HPV) vaccine is called Gardasil®9.
• This vaccine is available for all students to protect against some of the most common types of HPV.
• The vaccine provides best protection when it is given to someone before they become sexually active.
• Latest scientific and medical evidence shows that one dose of HPV vaccine gives excellent protection.
• From 6 February 2023, Year 7 students (aged 12-13 years) will only require one HPV vaccine to be fully vaccinated.

The Human Immunodeficiency Virus (HIV) is a virus which weakens a person’s immune system.

Without effective treatment, HIV can multiply within the body and destroy essential immune cells that work to help the body fight off infections.

It is important to remember that HIV is not the same as AIDS, as HIV is a virus and AIDS is a syndrome (set of symptoms) resulting from advanced HIV infection that has not been treated. Most people living with HIV in Australia are on effective treatment and do not have AIDS.

There have been updates to the Western Australian school-based immunisation program

• Commencing from Term 1, school-based immunisation program (SBIP) teams will offer Human papillomavirus (HPV), Diphtheria-Tetanus-Pertussis (dTpa), Meningococcal ACWY (Men ACWY) vaccines to students in Year 7 and 10.
• From 6 February 2023, healthy young people aged 12-13 years will only need one dose of the HPV vaccine to be considered fully vaccinated. 
• COVID-19 vaccines will be offered to those who are not up to date. 
• VaccinateWA online platform to be used to gain consent and record vaccinations.
• Paper forms will be made available to parents/guardians who cannot access VaccinateWA. SBIP teams will advise of how to access these.
• Information from paper forms will be entered into the VaccinateWA system, this means parents/guardians will receive email correspondence from the VaccinateWA system. 
• Schools are asked to assist the SBIP teams in following up parents who do not provide a response to the consent form.

Just as people have variations in height, eye colour and skin colour, they also have natural variations in hormones, chromosomes and sexual organs. People who are intersex are born with physical sex characteristics that do not fit the stereotypical and medical definitions for female and male bodies. The term 'intersex' is an umbrella term for many forms of intersex that exist; at least 40 variations are known.¹ It is estimated that around 1.7% of the populations have intersex characteristics which means in a school of 1000, approximately 17 students may have intersex variations.²

Some people with intersex variations may be apparent at birth (e.g. if the baby’s external genitals do not appear to be typically male or female) and some may be diagnosed prenatally. Many people with intersex variations, do not find out until they start to go through puberty (or do not start puberty) and this can be very challenging for young people in a school setting particularly if RSE lessons do not acknowledge this kind of diversity. Some people do not discover they have intersex variations until they try to have children, some find out through random chance and some never find out.

The term 'intersex' is different to the term 'transgender' or 'gender diverse'. Being transgender or gender diverse is when someone's sense of being male or female is different from the sex they were assigned at birth (see Gender Diversity). Most people who have intersex variations are understood to identify with the female or male sex they were assigned at birth, while some may not. They may identify as cisgender, transgender or gender diverse.