00:01 Sally Laskey: Welcome to NSVRC Resource on the Go. My name is Sally Laskey and I am the Evaluation Coordinator at the National Sexual Violence Resource Center. We are launching a series of episodes on comprehensive sexuality education. For our first sex ed talk, I'm joined today by Dr. Elizabeth Schroeder an award-winning educator, trainer, program consultant and author, specializing in sexuality education for youth, professionals and parents, LGBTQ affirming best practices, and working with adolescent boys.

00:37 SL: Dr. Schroeder is the former Executive Director of Answer, a national sexuality education organization dedicated to providing and promoting comprehensive sexuality education to young people and the adults who teach them.

00:52 SL: She has authored and co-authored numerous publications including 'Rights, Respect, Responsibility', the first ever K-12 sexuality education curriculum that is completely mapped to the national sexuality education standards, which we talk about in this podcast. But we also explore lessons learned from using technology and social media to educate about healthy sexuality and why sexuality education must be intersectional and informed by youth.

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01:41 SL: Welcome to the podcast, Elizabeth. We are excited to talk with you about the Rights, Respect, and Responsibility curriculum. Could you provide us some background on the development and structure of the curriculum? 

01:55 Dr. Elizabeth Schroeder: Sure. Well, first hi, and thank you for having me on your podcast. I'm really excited to talk about this curriculum as well, I'm a bit biased as you'll hear, to talk about the curriculum, I think we have to talk a little bit just briefly about structure and guidelines, so the way teachers decide what they teach in school are based on guidelines and standards, and they're usually made by national entities in one way, shape or form.

02:22 DS: So it's not like I decide as an English teacher, oh, I just feel like teaching this, it's really suggested that you wanna be able to teach kids at certain ages because developmentally they can understand it, and they need this information in order to go then to the next grade level. Now, there were never any standards for how to teach sexuality education in the United States, there were National Health Education Standards, and it mentioned just a little bit about sexuality education, but not specific standards for use in K-12 school settings.

02:57 DS: So back in 2012, we created National Sex Ed Standards, when I say we, this was a collection of more than 30 sexual health and youth development experts as well as young people, and they created the National Sex Ed Standards K-12, and they were released in 2012 and they were just updated this year, so they're available free online for any educator, whether they're a school-based educator or a community-based educator to learn more about this.

03:29 DS: So once teachers know what they're supposed to teach, whether in a school-based setting or again, at a religious institution or a community-based organization, they need the materials to be able to teach that information. And it's really challenging for a teacher today, a lot of times they have to scramble to find, oh, I have this curriculum, it doesn't work in this way, but this lesson I like, or like that video.

03:52 DS: And so what we decided, and when I say we this time I mean Advocates for Youth at National Youth Development organizations, they said we need a sex ed curriculum that is completely mapped to the National Sexuality Education Standards, and that's where Rights, Respect, Responsibility or the 3Rs came from... And so I'm very proud to be able to say that I'm a co-author of the curriculum, along with two wonderful colleagues of mine, Dr. Eva Goldfarb and Nora Gelperin, who is also the director of sexuality education and training at Advocates for Youth. So it's a grade K-12 curriculum. There are about 80 lessons, more than 80 at this point, and it's available completely online and for free.

04:37 SL: And that is so amazing that we have this resource. I am the daughter of two teachers, and a lot of my community of friends are teachers, and as someone that's been doing sexuality education most of my adult life... Really, really appreciate the time and effort that has been put into the curriculum. Could you talk a little bit more about what you think the strengths are of the curriculum, you mentioned the connection and being mapped out to the national standards, but what else do you think puts the curriculum above some other resources that are out there.

05:25 DS: Well, I have to say again that I'm a little biased about this curriculum, and having been a sexuality educator now for almost 30 years, I know and you know from your experience that there are a lot of curriculum programs out there, so we know what's available and based on what is out there I do think there are some unique strengths of the 3Rs curriculum. First and foremost, one of the things from the outset, we said is we are gonna make sure this is the most inclusive and affirming curriculum of all student sexual orientations and gender identities. You know well that most sex ed curriculum programs, even if they're written in gender-neutral ways, they're still inherently skewed towards cisgender girls and heterosexual learners, even if it's not explicit, it really still focuses on and hones in on the needs of those learners.

06:19 DS: And so our lessons are written in ways that resonate with young people of all genders and all sexual orientations and identities. I think the second thing that's unique is that it is free and accessible online, a lot of the sex ed curricula out there are very expensive and that's cost-prohibitive for people to use. And especially now with what we're experiencing with COVID-19, budgets are being cut at schools and elsewhere, and so the budgets for materials for professional development are quite limited, a lot of curricula out there, as you know, also require that teachers go through training in order to be able to use it.

07:00 DS: Now, Advocates for Youth offers trainings on how best to implement the 3Rs curriculum, but it's not required. So it's really, really accessible to people no matter where they are. The other really neat thing about it being online is that it's adaptable by anyone in any community. So there's no curriculum out there that's gonna be perfect for all learners of all identities, needs, backgrounds. And so, for example, when we wrote the lessons, we wrote this for neuro-typical learners, so there are plenty of schools that have complete classes, or there are entire schools that really work best with children with learning differences or intellectual disabilities or who are neuro-atypical.

07:51 DS: And for those folks, what they can do is download the lessons, they're Word documents and PowerPoints, and they can make adaptations based on their own expertise for how best to serve the unique learners in their classes, so it's as accessible as possible, and thanks to really the leadership of Debra Houser, who's the president of Advocates for Youth, she was able to secure funding so that it isn't a teaser, it isn't... We're gonna make this available for a year or two, and then eventually you have to buy it... It's free forever. And that's just amazing.

08:28 SL: I know, I get chills every time you say free [chuckle]

08:32 SL: That's not something that I think a lot of the folks that we try to support are used to hearing. Something else that I think I've been reading about the develop of the curriculum, is that there was specific attention to how youth were involved in the creation of the curriculum. Could you speak at all to how that came about and what that involved.

09:00 DS: Sure, so there's a couple of layers there. So first and foremost, as I mentioned, there were young people who were involved in the National Sexuality Education standards development in terms of providing their input and feedback, what's important for them to know. I think we are guilty as adults, whether we're parents, or educator that can happen between adults and youth, and as we're seeing today, with everything that's going on, that young people also need to lead much more than we allow them and enable them to lead in many situations. So from the beginning with the National Sex Ed standards, that was wonderful to have youth voices.

09:48 DS: Advocates for Youth, all of their work is youth-centric and about creating future adult leaders out of young people who are just amazing, amazing leaders already as young people. So to have some of their youth, and they're actually listed on the 3Rs website, when somebody goes and looks at the curriculum, if you look at the background, you'll see a number of the young people who did review of the lessons, and so that's very useful to get their voices in.

10:18 DS: The third thing that is sort of an ongoing way of having youth voices involved always is when I was mentioning that the lessons are available, the curriculum is available online, what that means is as other states are doing their adaptations based on state law or based on their individual expertise or their populations and communities, and they're making revisions, they're integrating the input and the experiences of young people, so what happens is they have been very generously sharing their versions with Advocates for Youth, so what we have... The curriculum is constantly being reviewed and tweaked and updated.

11:00 DS: Or full versions are uploaded in case there's someone, say in the state of California, where they have a specific state law that has to be adhered to, and so if there's someone down in San Diego who wants to be able to teach... Oh, they might be able to learn something or contribute something to someone up north in California, and then someone who is in North Carolina might just find it useful to know that... So in that way, the way youth are showing up is how they have had an impact on the expansion and revision of the lessons.

11:36 SL: That's really great to hear, this crowd sourcing that has developed around the curriculum, and it kind of brings me to the next area I wanted to talk about, which you've kind of hinted to in some earlier discussion, and as we're all adjusting and adapting with COVID-19, how we're using technology to connect with each other to support each other and to educate each other is really at the forefront of most of our discussions right now. And using technology is becoming a regular part of sex education. What lessons have you learned about using technology and social media to educate about healthy sexuality? 

12:41 DS: A while ago, how many years would it be, I would say 10 years or more that I was the Executive Director of Answer, and Answer is a National Sexuality Education organization that is based at Rutgers University in New Jersey. And Answer has been doing online sexuality education and professional development for sexuality educators for many years, and so I had that experience of being part of this amazing organization and wonderful professionals and young people to both develop, maintain, learn from, and adapt what we used. So at the beginning, of course, there was just websites, and then there was how do we make websites more interactive, and then there were social media, and then there was online professional development that was just a webinar, and now Answer has more interactive professional development workshops, and their amazing resource Sex, Etc. Which is sexetc.org, it started as a magazine, still is a magazine, but is also a website online at sexetc.org and that is a resource that's written by teenagers for teenagers.

13:52 DS: Now, the difference here is that, again, collaboration and partnership. There's collaboration and partnership between the young people and the adult professionals who have the expertise to make sure that the information is medically accurate and that it's age and developmentally appropriate for teens as opposed to something that is to higher level, that might be better for a college or an older aged audience, or that it doesn't sound too little kid so that it wouldn't resonate with teenagers.

14:22 DS: So I will say first and foremost that I think technology is awesome, and I think that it can be used to educate young people, and at the same time, I also think using technology to educate young people can be problematic, but for a few different reasons. That isn't necessarily technology's fault. So first and foremost, young people today, they're native users of technology, it's one of the first languages they learn to "speak", if that makes sense.

14:56 DS: And adults, we're always gonna be behind, we're probably never gonna catch up, there are a lot of adults who are probably in technology and know way more than we do as sexuality educators or a typical educator would know. And so this is another rationale for partnering with young people, I think adults, especially educators and parents and caregivers, we think we're supposed to know everything. And it feels vulnerable or like we're not doing our jobs if we don't know everything before we engage with a young person, and that's just not necessary. I've taught in college and I've taught in grad school, and I've taught groups of high school and middle school students as a guest educator, and so I've learned a lot from them and how they use technology, and I haven't even learned anywhere nearly as much as I really need to.

15:49 DS: But some of the things I have learned that I think are important to keep in mind, which is first and foremost, there's using technology to teach about sexuality, and then there's teaching young people how to be critical thinkers and educated consumers of what they're consuming in technology, whether that's social media or websites, or online, or porn, or YouTube videos or anything like that. There's some great resources out there, and like I mentioned, Sex, Etc., and there are unfortunately, a lot of people out there who were just putting out misinformation, anybody can call themselves a sexuality educator, and instead of basing what they share with young people on what we know to be true, or research, or anything like that, sometimes on YouTube, they'll just read an article or a blog post, or see something that's a video and then just give their commentary or to speak from their personal experience. Now, there's a place for sharing personal experience as long as someone consents to doing that and feels comfortable sharing that, but that's not the basis of sexuality education.

17:02 DS: We don't come into a classroom and talk about our sexual experiences, that's not the point of sex ed, so there is so much out there and being developed and young people consume it the speed of light, so teaching some skills about how to recognize, oh, this is a reliable website, oh, this should be taken with a grain of salt, oh, this is actually quite shame and fear-based, this is not a website or a resource or a social media channel that you wanna use or follow.

17:31 DS: The second thing that I've learned from them is it's so important to be flexible on how we teach, and say for example, the assignments that we have for folk. So for example, one homework assignment I know that I've used in the curricula that I've written, not just the 3Rs is interview someone in your life. It really is fun for both young people and their parents or caregivers to talk about what was sex ed like back in the day, they think we're all 300 years old. So to say to them, wow, this is what we're learning now. What did you learn when you were a teenager? Kicking it old school is you have a piece of paper, you sit with somebody, and you write down their answers whether hand-written, or even doing it on the computer and just typing up the answers. But... How about being creative? 

18:24 DS: What about asking the young people to decide for themselves, how do you wanna do this interview. If folks feel like they don't wanna put that burden on young people, or if we're a little bit of a control freak, 'cause I can certainly relate to, we can also have a more flexible assignment that says, Use your phones, use video, use Zoom, record it if you have permission to record it. Or do the video, and then why don't you create a Tik-Tok where you get to imitate how the adult reacted when you first told them you wanted to talk about sexuality with them, I mean, there's lots of creative ways of doing this and sex ed should be way more fun than I think it's treated. There are definitely serious topics that are within sex and sexuality education, but this is a wonderful, important, beautiful part of who we are, and so we should approach it in that way. And have a sense of humor too.

19:19 SL: I agree, I have all of these images of Tik-Tok videos now streaming through my head that I could imagine. I do wanna be really thoughtful in talking about how we make this work fun, this connection between youth with youth and adults, this community work that we're doing, and how we can do that and also acknowledge the extremely harmful sexual stereotypes, and frankly, inadequate health care that many black, indigenous and other youth of color experience. So do you have any ideas or tips or techniques that you and the folks that you've worked with have used that can work to address those harmful stereotypes? 

20:24 DS: That is such an important question, and honestly, it's a topic for an entire podcast on its own, and I'm sure there are many wonderful educators who are going ahead and talking about these, and especially educators of color, although people of all identities should be talking about this. You know very well that the power structure in this country is dominated by white, heterosexual, cisgender men and women, and our history in this country of racism, sexism, hyper-sexualization of young people, especially youth of color, as well as specific to healthcare, either absent or abuse of healthcare treatment, this history is so ugly. And it's far from over.

21:12 DS: And so the first thing we need to do is we need to talk about it. We need to teach about it. I don't think it is being taught anywhere nearly as much and as explicitly as it needs to be taught about. Young people of all backgrounds need to know the history, young people don't know, by and large, I'm generalizing or they don't hear enough. It's a mentioned in a textbook or in an online article about the Tuskegee experiments or about Henrietta Lacks and who she was and how her cells were used without her consent, and we're still using them today.

21:49 DS: They don't hear about the forced sterilization of too many black and brown people over the years, the abhorrent treatment of enslaved people, that was in general, and then also specific to health and medical experiments done on them. So the very, very first thing is we need to talk about it, we need a major major overhaul of all topics. Now, this is specific to sexuality education, but this needs to be woven through every single topic throughout the school curriculum. There are so many lost opportunities for talking about this, we're teaching about it, and for teaching about it directly, unapologetically and explicitly young people can handle it. They're already getting stories at home, and so you wanna really reinforce what they hear about, what they see, and also teach what they're not hearing about, what they're not seeing.

22:50 DS: So that's really, really an overarching umbrella thing that we just need to do as a culture, and I'm hopeful in this moment, tentatively hopeful that all of the social unrest, the protests, all of the things that are happening around the most recent killings of black and brown people around the country is going to help a major cultural shift, although unfortunately the folks in power who are in that white, heterosexual, cisgender dominant power structure are digging in their heels not to change that. So this is a sisyphean task, it shouldn't be this hard, it shouldn't be this difficult, but it's this hard and difficult because there are enough people in power who are saying, "I don't want this to change, I don't wanna tell these stories, I don't wanna talk about this, I'm not comfortable doing this."

23:44 DS: And all of that is also connected to who is developing the materials that are being used to teach, whether those are print materials or digital materials, and then where are those materials being used. So a lot of stuff is out there. On the internet, there are a lot of print materials, but whose materials are being used in the classrooms, how many educators of color do we have in classrooms, how many educators of color have written curricula that are getting into classrooms and getting into community-based organizations. So I'll say that I'm proud of the work I do as a sexuality educator myself, but as a white cisgender educator, mine is not the only voice, nor should it be the loudest voice that's heard in classrooms today.

24:33 SL: And Elizabeth, I appreciate all of that that you are sharing and that recommendations for us as a field to dig in and work harder. We do have a series planned around healthy sexuality, so we will be bringing in lots of different voices to help us look at this field, and that we are looking at sexuality in the most appropriate way we can to honor all people's sexualities and their experiences. So as we're digging in and continuing to do the best work or better work in this area, what do you think is the most critical issue facing work to bring comprehensive sexuality education to youth around the United States? 

25:37 DS: Well, I think certainly what we were just talking about is enormous, we don't have sexuality education that is resonating with all learners. Even if folks develop a curriculum and they have visual images that represent diversity and skin tone, that's a very tokenizing way of saying that there's a diverse sexuality education. So we have to be sure, whoever we are, that we are doing this in meaningful ways. It's not enough to have a class session where we talk about racism and sexual health and education, this has to be the lens through which sexuality education is taught, and that is something where white educators in particular really need to learn more, they need to move back and let educators of color lead. It's really a huge, huge, high priority.

26:33 DS: Another critical issue that I'll share in addition to that is something that we've been dealing with really almost the entire time I've been doing this work, which is we have a dominant power structure that is proactively invested in keeping young people from getting age and developmentally appropriate sexuality education. These are the first people who will rail against the fact that young people are going online to poring for their sex ed, and yet they are the same people who push the government to spend money on abstinence only until heterosexual marriage programs. And those programs have been funded for, gosh, I guess it's about 25 years now, to the tune of over a billion dollar, a billion dollars in tax payer money.

27:22 DS: And these are programs that withhold life-saving information from young people, they mislead young people, and in some cases, they just flat out lie. Absolutely, no problem. They're designed to make young people feel ashamed, to feel like dirt, because if you feel bad about yourself, then you're not gonna wanna be interested in being sexual with another person, and you may have heard the stories, or actually seeing them in action of the lessons that compare people who have sex, unless they're married to a partner of a different sex, that they're chewed up and spit out pieces of gum, even if they just think about sex and sexuality, which is the most developmentally appropriate human part of us. Of course we think about it, of course we are interested in it, of course, we're curious about it, especially when we're young people, but because abstinence only until heterosexual marriage programs are rooted in conservative Christian ideology, I'm not criticizing Christianity, but very specifically, these programs are rooted in a conservative Christian ideology, even though they're being taught in schools.

28:32 DS: These programs take a very absolutist approach. So what that means is they incorrectly treat young people as being incapable of controlling themselves. So they really think, mistakenly, that if we teach young people about sex and sexuality, we're basically encouraging them to become sexually active, or that there's a greater likelihood and every single bit of research that has asked about that has found that talking with young people, especially when a parent or caregiver talks with their kids, actually helps young people to delay the first time they start being sexual with another partner consensually, and if they do start having sex, they use contraceptives, safer sex methods far more consistently and correctly. So it just blows my mind that we have all of this money that is wasted and continues to be listed on really setting young people up for failure.

29:34 SL: It is shocking, and thank you for bringing back into the dialogue this importance of critical thinking and how we can approach healthy sexuality as teaching critical thinking, and how powerful youth are to make good choices and build good relationships when they have access to quality information. So I know we could spend probably a few more hours talking about this, but I just wanted to thank you so much for your time and sharing your expertise and giving us a lot of questions to bring into the next Resource on the Go podcast that we'll be doing around this topic. So thank you for joining us today, Dr. Schroeder. We invite folks to learn more about your work and the 3Rs curriculum by checking out the links in the show notes, and we hope that you all will join us for more conversations about healthy sexuality in the weeks to come. Thank you.

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31:01 SL: Thanks for listening to this episode of Resource on the Go. For more resources and information about preventing sexual assault, visit our website at www.nsvrc.org. You can also get in touch with us by emailing resources@nsvrc.org.

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