Changes to consent education need to be backed by non-government schools

Content warning: This post contains reference to sexual assault, consent, sexual education and suicide.

I've had more conversations about consent and sex education in the last three weeks than I can count. Between Brittany Higgins' rape allegations, historic rape allegations made against Attorney-General Christian Porter and a petition launched by former private school student Chanel Contos; issues of sexual assault, consent and sexual education have been at the forefront of the minds of many of the women I know.

I recently went out with an old school friend and we spoke about sex education in the context of Chanel Contos' petition.

Between the two of us we remembered the lessons we recalled our high school sexual education teaching us about the anatomical mechanics of sex, the risk of STIs and the existence of contraception.

Each lesson was followed by a stern reminder that the teaching of the Catholic Church is that sex should not happen outside of marriage and we should practice abstinence. There was no clear instruction on consent, power dynamics or relationships outside the context of Catholic marriage. And there was absolutely no mention of LGBTQ+ relationships, sex or healthcare.

Talking about it with my friend, I became incensed to realise that the sex education I received at a public school as a Year 6 student was more age-appropriate, clear and comprehensive than anything that I was taught as a teenager in a Catholic high school.

That cannot be acceptable if we want to move forward. In recent weeks, as the broader public has grappled with the magnitude of change that is needed to adequately address sexual violence across the country, there have been promising steps towards improving consent and sexual education in schools.

NSW Police have met with key stakeholders in the education sector. And yesterday, a petition for better consent education to be debated in NSW Parliament received bipartisan support.

But we cannot let that be good enough. There is one big issue here and that is consistency. Any progress that we make in improving consent and sexual education for students needs to be consistent. That means firstly that consent and sexual education should look the same for all students regardless of whether they attend a state school, a Catholic school or an independent school. And secondly, it means that consent and sexual education needs to be nationally consistent.

Anything less than that puts young people at undue risk. It means that while some students receive comprehensive, inclusive and sensitive sexual education, others will not. Yet, all of those students exist in spaces together outside of school; at sports clubs, at parties, in their homes and out in public. And that's just before they leave school.

If we want to be able to build a society where all people have an appropriate understanding of consent, respect, bodily autonomy and safe sex, we need to start by teaching them the same lessons.

There is no doubt that current consent and sexual education needs improvement, but if we choose to champion those changes we must ensure it makes a difference for every student.

National Sexual Assault, Domestic Family Violence Counselling Service: 1800 737 732