 |
| Sexual harassment at school Source: www.demandthechange.wordpress.com |
Compulsory anti-grooming lessons could
soon be held in schools all over the UK.
Labour’s shadow Women and Equalities
minister Sarah Champion put forward proposals to ensure sex and relationship
education sessions take place in academies, free schools and new grammar
schools for pupils aged 5 and above.
Under the current UK curriculum, in
fact, only sexual health education is mandatory and from Year 7 onwards, while
teaching young people about relationships and sexual consent is not.
The move follows publication of a worrying
64-page report from the Women and Equalities Committee.
The document, which was made public in September, contains striking statistics: almost a third of female students aged 16-18 has experienced unwanted sexual touching in schools across England (2010 data), while 59 per cent of girls and women aged 13-21 has faced some form of sexual harassment at school or college in 2014.
The document, which was made public in September, contains striking statistics: almost a third of female students aged 16-18 has experienced unwanted sexual touching in schools across England (2010 data), while 59 per cent of girls and women aged 13-21 has faced some form of sexual harassment at school or college in 2014.
Sexual violence, which can also be
visual or verbal, undermines the self-esteem and confidence of its victims and
therefore cannot be taken lightly.
The House of Commons document has been
an opportunity for MPs to highlight an
alarming inconsistency in how schools deal with sexual harassment and violence,
reason why educational institutions are urged to collect and publish data on
reports of such crimes, while the police should record the incidents they
investigate.
More specifically, MPs heard evidence that
many institutes are either under-reporting incidents or failing to take them seriously
and stressed that the Government should
give schools national guidance on how to tackle the issue, while Ofsted should
follow by assessing how well they are recording, monitoring, preventing and
responding to incidents of harassment and violence.
Parents interviewed during the
investigations seemed to agree on what the House of Commons declared and reported
lack of proper and quick action by schools.
Teachers have however answered by stressing that children and teenagers spend most of their time outside school
and even though parents sometimes struggle to spot how they can best support
their progeny, tackling sexual harassment is not a straightforward task for
teachers either. Tutors are often overwhelmed by long lists of targets to meet and paperwork
to complete and need better support and guidance to make change happen.
Moreover, a culture of internet and
pornography can play a role in the problem and being boys and young men an
important part of the solution, Government should tackle the ‘lad culture’
since primary school.
Ms Champion's proposals could
be the beginning of a new approach to fight sexual harassment and violence at school, according to the priciple that educational institutions should always be
safe and empowering places to stay.
