What kind of culture and (safe) atmosphere do you create together in your classes and at your school? When is something okay and when is it not, and how do you know? Through conversations like these, everyone can develop their ‘sexual integrity’: dealing consciously, respectfully and responsibly with their own sexuality and gender and those of others. Talking about this increases safety at your school, helps prevent sexually inappropriate behaviour and makes it easier for pupils to share when they have experienced something that crossed a boundary.

Guidance for this conversation

Would you like to talk about what is going on in the class, but are you not quite sure how? Here are some pointers that may help you:

What can you talk about?

  • Avoid focusing too much on exactly what happened, who did what, what is or is not true, and so on. Instead, focus on what is going on with pupils and students: what questions do they have, and what does this bring up for them?
  • Avoid placing too much emphasis on perpetrator–victim roles. Also avoid attributing these roles to men or women; both can be perpetrators and victims.
  • Explore together (depending on the age of your pupils or students) why this is such a complicated subject. Victims often wait a long time and hesitate before telling their story. They are afraid they will not be believed or will be blamed for having provoked it; they may doubt whether what happened really was not okay, or they may feel loyal to the perpetrator.
  • Explore together what sexual integrity means and what you can do yourselves. For example, discuss these questions:

How do you know what your wishes and boundaries are? How do you communicate them? How do you know what someone else does or does not want? What do you do if you see someone doing something that crosses a boundary or that you think another person does not like? When is a joke no longer funny? What makes touching okay or not okay? Who decides that?

  • Would you like to know more about how to work with pupils on the topic of wishes and boundaries? Visit www.seksuelevorming.nl, for example, and look at the topic of resilience, the special module on wishes and boundaries from Lang Leve de Liefde, or the topic for the 2022 Week of the Spring Fever.
  • An additional element in the conversation could be to include yourself and your own position as a teacher. Perhaps you sometimes do or say something that pupils or students do not like. Do they dare to say so, and what could you do about it?
  • Do you teach in vocational education? Then also discuss the work placement as a place where pupils may encounter unequal power relations or sexually inappropriate behaviour. You can read about what you can do to support them in this in ‘Safe on work placement’.
  • Rutgers also offers tips on how to discuss the situation surrounding The Voice in class. Read Rutgers’ recommendations here.

Care for your pupils or students

Sexually inappropriate behaviour is a sensitive subject and can in particular bring up a great deal for pupils or students who have experienced it themselves.

  • To create a safe atmosphere for them, it is crucial always to communicate the following message during a classroom conversation: “It is never ‘your fault’, and if someone does something like that, it is never okay.”
  • You can read what you should and should not say when a pupil or student tells you about sexually inappropriate behaviour in this article.
  • Make sure pupils know where they can go if they would like to discuss anything further following the classroom conversation. This could be someone in their circle or a teacher they trust, their mentor or student counsellor, or the Kindertelefoon. If the sexually inappropriate behaviour involved someone at school, they can contact the confidential adviser.

An ethical school culture

Power relations are a risk factor for sexually inappropriate behaviour, and power relationships also play a role at school. That is why, in addition to a classroom conversation, it is advisable to look with colleagues at the culture at school and thus pay attention to sexually respectful interaction with one another as a team and with pupils or students. This can be difficult, but it must not remain unspoken, because that actually increases the likelihood of boundary-crossing behaviour.

  • You can read about how to work towards a sexually respectful school culture and ethical behaviour among school staff in this article.
  • A relationship or sexual contact between a teacher and a pupil is not appropriate. If there is a suspicion of sexually inappropriate behaviour by a person working at the school, read here how to act.
  • Nevertheless, a teacher in secondary or vocational education may sometimes develop such feelings for a pupil. Read in this article what you can do if you notice these kinds of feelings in yourself.

In short, talk together about sexual integrity in response to the events surrounding The Voice or another trigger.

Would you like to talk things through before getting started? Then call the School & Veiligheid helpdesk.