Teach Us Consent: The fight to get mandatory sexual consent education in schools

An Auckland College scholar is platforming sexual assault survivors’ tales in a bid to get mandatory sexual consent education included within the faculty curriculum.

Genna Hawkins-Boulton, 24, mentioned “complete and holistic consent training is a primary proper that each scholar ought to have entry to”.

Hawkins-Boulton is a survivor of sexual assault and mentioned she puzzled if that might have been averted if each herself and the perpetrator have been taught about consent.

“I do know that I wouldn’t have been within the state of affairs [that I was in] and I might have realized the best way to cope with it.”

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New figures from the Ministry of Justice New Zealand Crime and Victims Survey showed almost 30% of New Zealand adults experienced intimate partner violence or sexual violence sooner or later of their life.

With these figures in thoughts, Hawkins-Boulton determined she wanted to do one thing, out of “pure frustration”.

She shared a Google submission kind on her Instagram web page and invited sexual assault survivors to share their experiences in a protected and nameless house.

“It began with me asking folks to recount their expertise of sexual assault and also what kind of sexual consent education they had had,” she mentioned.

“I used to be attempting to make a transparent hyperlink to lack of sexual consent training to the lack to cope with the sexual assault, to grasp it and recognise it because it was.”

Hawkins-Boulton’s Instagram posts picked up steam and it was barely 24 hours later when Australian Chanel Costos contacted her.

Costos shot to worldwide notoriety in 2021 when she made an identical Instagram put up, asking Sydney college students if that they had skilled sexual assault – which consequently blew up with testimonies.

The social media motion, now dubbed Train Us Consent, resulted in training reform throughout Australia, with New South Wales implementing affirmative consent laws and Australian schools mandating consent education in 2023.

Costos mentioned she was “actually excited” Hawkins-Boulton was attempting to realize the identical type of necessary sexual consent training.

“We’re completely satisfied to assist her in any means we will, Australia and New Zealand share such an identical tradition, it might make sense for a similar modifications there,” Chanel mentioned.

MPs David Seymour and Deborah Russell have additionally since come on board.

Sexuality training is necessary for state and state-integrated colleges for college kids in all yr ranges.

“In New Zealand, schools are empowered to make their own decisions around what is taught,” the Ministry of Schooling’s Pauline Cleaver mentioned.

“Faculties know their communities greatest and are due to this fact greatest positioned to make these choices.”

In 2020, the Ministry of Schooling refreshed its Relationship and Sexuality Education guidelines, which aren’t necessary, however “emphasises the significance of age-appropriate consent training”.

“College students should have a clear understanding of consent by age 12 – to have the talents to say ‘no’ and listen to ‘no’ in relation to consent,” Cleaver mentioned.

Nonetheless, Hawkins-Boulton mentioned consent training went additional than that and was not nearly figuring out the best way to say “no”, however figuring out what to do if one other individual didn’t settle for that reply.

Hawkins-Boulton will likely be marching in assist of necessary sexual consent training with a bunch of sexual assault survivors on Saturday, in Auckland’s Albert Park.