Comprehensive Sexuality Education and Information

2024-07-26

Published by: Victoria Nnesa

As the world becomes increasingly complex, with children maturing earlier and being exposed to diverse sources of information, the need for Comprehensive Sexuality Education and Information (CSE&I) has become urgent. It is crucial to ensure that children are equipped with the necessary knowledge, skills, and information regarding their sexuality to better navigate both the present and future. Families, schools, and religious institutions play key roles in this process.

 

The overall goal of the workshop was to engage religious leaders, parents, and young people in comprehensive sexual and reproductive health education to enable young people to enjoy their sexual health and rights safely and responsibly. The workshop was jointly sponsored by INERELA, Save The Children, and UNESCO.

 

Workshop Objectives:

  • Provide accurate information and knowledge on CSE, its importance, and its benefits to young people in their congregations.
  • Identify entry points, content, teaching strategies, methodologies, tools, and resource materials for delivering culturally sensitive and age-appropriate CSE to youth in places of worship.
  • Recognize how personal values, beliefs, and biases can influence the teaching of life skills, gender, and human-rights-based comprehensive sexuality education, and the importance of preventing negative impacts from personal values on the quality of CSE provided to learners.
  • Describe the process-oriented approach to sexuality, gender, HIV, and SRHR for effective CSE&I in congregational settings.
  • Map out stakeholders needed to roll out CSE at the congregational level.
  • Identify strategies and develop a work plan for implementing the skills acquired, and monitor and evaluate the rollout of CSE at the country level through INERELA structures.

 

Overview of Young People’s SRH Needs and Rights in the ESA Region: Every child should have access to education as a fundamental right, and schools are ideal for comprehensive sexuality education. Notably, while primary schools start with 100% enrollment in the first grade, only 14% of students, especially girls, make it to secondary education due to high dropout rates. Education strengthens resilience, reduces gender-based violence, decreases teenage pregnancies, and lowers the rate of HIV infections. Young people in school are less likely to engage in sexual activity and are more likely to use contraceptives. Less than 33% of women across Eastern and Southern Africa have sufficient knowledge about HIV prevention.

 

Nyasha’s Story: Nyasha is in her second year of secondary school, lives with her parents, attends church and Sunday school, and belongs to the girls' association. She is a happy girl who enjoys the company of her friends. Everything changes when Nyasha falls pregnant and drops out of school. This raises questions about what could have been done differently by Nyasha, her boyfriend, parents, schools, and church:

  • Providing good quality CSE (including information on pregnancy prevention and contraception).
  • Ensuring the right to education (development and effective implementation of re-entry policies).
  • Increasing adolescent access to health education and services (including contraception) through the establishment of a referral system between schools and health facilities.
  • Eliminating stigma and discrimination toward pregnant/childbearing girls in schools and communities.
  • Spending more time with children to give them age-appropriate CSE&I.

 

Role of Community: We all have a role to play, ensuring that messages given to young people at home are consistent and reinforced at home and church. Young people need us to listen and talk to them about their lives, helping them feel secure and loved. Reflecting on our own youth can help us understand their situations without judgment. They need to understand that their rights come with responsibilities and the importance of focusing on the future and having role models. Schools need to provide safe environments free from stigma and discrimination, recognizing the right to education even for learners who fall pregnant.

 

Sexuality in Africa / Spirituality and Sexuality: Sexuality is part of one’s identity, encompassing feelings, thoughts, behavior, orientation, expression, and attraction. It can be shaped by culture, religion, and education but is inherent to an individual. Spirituality is a connection to a divine source or inner voice, while religion provides guidance through dogmatic and sometimes unquestionable rules, which can be used to suppress sexuality. Religious leaders may use scripture to control their congregation. Practical steps to integrate spirituality and sexuality include creative messaging, youth activities, and parent organizations.

 

Overview of CSE and Spirituality: The workshop began with a reflection and devotion led by Sheikh Maulidi from Malawi, who preached a message of love despite different backgrounds, disregarding extremist groups.

 

Religion and Sexuality: A study on religious leaders and CSE&I in Eastern and Southern Africa (May-June 2015) aimed to:

  • Establish theologians' views on CSE&I.
  • Identify current trends in CSE&I within faith communities.
  • Compare how different faith communities respond to CSE&I.
  • Provide evidence of children’s access to CSE&I within religious settings.
  • Recommend how religious leaders could enhance CSE&I within faith communities.

The study found that faith communities possess many positive characteristics for promoting CSE&I, such as ownership of health facilities, existing structures, and the potential to use sacred texts creatively to support CSE&I. Religious leaders, as community power brokers, enjoy significant trust. Training these leaders in CSE&I has a notable impact on awareness, though doctrines, perceptions, and traditions pose barriers.

UNAIDS Fast Track Agenda: The current status of the HIV epidemic in Eastern Southern Africa identifies high-risk populations such as sex workers, IV drug users, and men who have sex with men (MSM). The Fast Track Agenda aims for 90% of those infected with HIV to know their status, 90% of those diagnosed to be on treatment, and 90% of those on treatment to achieve viral suppression. Religious leaders in Eastern and Southern Africa are called to support the Fast Track Agenda due to their significant influence in society.

Linking Sexuality to HIV Prevention: Human development occurs along various dimensions, including physical, cognitive, emotional, social, and moral/spiritual, all of which are present in children. Most HIV infections (80%) are sexually transmitted, with 18% from mother-to-child transmission and 2% via other methods. The main drivers of HIV infections include multiple concurrent sexual partners, low condom use, low rates of VMMC (voluntary medical male circumcision), MTCT (mother-to-child transmission), migrant workers, and poverty. Linking sexual and reproductive health and rights is key to reducing HIV infections. Sex should be happy, healthy, and safe before, during, and after. Vulnerable groups include women and girls, those living with disabilities, truck drivers, and sex workers. Congregational interventions could include intergenerational dialogues, youth clubs, parents' clubs, and community-based organizations.

 

Comprehensive Sexuality Education: Sexuality includes sex, gender identity, sexual orientation, reproduction, fantasies, and desires. Sexuality education is a lifelong process of acquiring information and forming attitudes, beliefs, and values about identity and relationships. CSE&I promotes human rights, values, knowledge, skills, and gender equality. Comprehensive sexuality education must be scientifically accurate, age-appropriate, culturally appropriate, gender-sensitive, and life skills-based. The goal is to equip children and young people with the knowledge, skills, and values to make responsible choices about their sexual and social relationships in a world affected by HIV. Components of CSE&I include puberty, reproduction, values, love, family, and gender identity. Values underlying CSE&I include being non-judgmental, positive, recurrent, non-normative, realistic, and affirmative.

Process-Oriented Approach: Adopted by Save the Children, this approach targets the adult community, a critical stakeholder in CSE&I. It focuses on changing mindsets regarding sexuality and gender, internalizing new ways of thinking, and challenging entrenched beliefs. Sexuality education must include more than just facts and information, addressing deeply rooted perceptions and behaviors related to sexuality. The approach is comprehensive, covering a broad range of topics.

 

Rights-Based Approach to CSE and Child Rights Programming: The UNCRC (Children’s Rights Charter) is built on four general principles: non-discrimination, the best interest of the child, the right to be heard, and the right to life, survival, and development. The African Charter on the Rights and Welfare of the Child (ACRWC), inspired by the UNCRC, recognizes and affirms these rights, taking into account cultural contexts and addressing African-specific concerns. Since children are human beings, all human rights instruments also apply to them. A rights-based approach to development contrasts with a needs-based approach. Both aim to help people survive and develop to their full potential, but a rights-based approach emphasizes legally established claims and entitlements, holding stakeholders accountable.

 

Strategies for Scaling Up CSE Delivery in Religious Platforms: Each country team developed ways to scale up comprehensive sexuality education in their respective countries. A common challenge identified was the lack of resources. Recommendations included:

  • Follow-up workshops to continuously equip religious leaders, parents, and youth on scaling up CSE in their communities.
  • Establishing forums for young people through similar channels.
  • Linking participants to trainers, master trainers, and mentors previously trained by Save the Children in their countries.

 

Child rights, CSE&I, faith-based organizations, HIV, rights, Save the Children, sexuality, spirituality, SRHR, and UNESCO are all interconnected in promoting comprehensive sexuality education and ensuring the well-being of young people. Continuous efforts and collaborations are essential for the successful implementation and scaling up of CSE&I across different communities and regions.

Published by: Victoria Nnesa