Official Report: Minutes of Evidence

The Chairperson (Mr Mathison): Good afternoon. You are all very welcome today. Thank you for giving up your time and agreeing to give evidence to the Committee on the relationships and sexuality education (RSE) inquiry. I will do a quick introduction.

Most of you will be familiar to the Committee, but I welcome Linsey Farrell, deputy secretary in education, policy and children's services in the Department; Sam Dempster, head of curriculum policy in the Department; Elaine McAllister, managing inspector in the Education and Training Inspectorate (ETI); and Fionnuala McCann, managing inspector in early years and safeguarding in ETI.

You are all very welcome. We have received some papers from you. That is appreciated, and we thank you for that. We will hand over to you for a presentation of up to 10 minutes. We are really tight for time in the briefings, so they will be shorter than a normal evidence hearing might be. The time slot is in and around 30 minutes. You have up to 10 minutes for your presentation, and then we will move on to questions and answers so that we can get through the evidence sessions.

There is nothing more for me to say, so I will hand over to you. We are looking forward to getting an overview of where we are in the system from an inspection and departmental policy position. I will hand over to you.

Mrs Linsey Farrell (Department of Education): Thank you very much, Chair. I really welcome the opportunity to provide some opening remarks to the Committee today together with my colleague Sam from the Department and colleagues from the Education and Training Inspectorate. I hope that the written briefing that we provided will help the Committee in its consideration of the issue. I will try to keep my opening remarks as brief as possible.

The Committee will know that the Department provided a briefing on the changes that the Secretary of State and the Department's regulations made to the circumstances in which a parent can request that a pupil be excused from specific aspects of the RSE curriculum. In line with the requirements of the Secretary of State's regulations, the Department also published guidance by 1 January this year.

The Committee will be aware that the curriculum is designed to be broad and balanced. While there appears to be a current focus on RSE being the only way that people can be prepared for the adult world, the Department contends that mathematical and language skills, together with an understanding of science and technology, are as important.

The Department has been developing wider RSE guidance for schools to consolidate the information that has previously been provided and to address the findings of the inspectorate's thematic evaluation of the preventative curriculum, as well as responding to the Human Rights Commission report into RSE. I understand that the commission has also presented to the Committee today.

Throughout June, the Department consulted a broad range of stakeholders on the proposed content of the guidance. It was interesting that, for the young people whom we met, the key issue was having respectful relationships. Given recent events, that is more important now than ever. They also want education in those wider skills that I mentioned.

We met the Youth Assembly's Education Committee on 30 August and discussed the wider area of learning for life and work (LLW). The young people with whom we engaged were more interested in human rights and citizenship, careers and financial literacy than RSE. The guidance is intended to support schools as they evaluate, develop and deliver RSE provision to meet the needs of their pupils at all Key Stages. Subject to ministerial approval, that guidance will be issued to schools in the autumn. The guidance is designed to be agile, and it will remain under review and can be updated and reissued if required.

We know that, while there are examples of good practice across all areas of learning, as there should be, there is also variation in the effectiveness and range of approaches across schools. Therefore, we need to support teachers and build their confidence and competence in order to address issues that can be sensitive to them. That includes their being supported by boards of governors, which, in turn, need to be supported by our colleagues in the Education Authority (EA). I know that the EA is also presenting to the Committee today.

The growing use of social media and its implications for online safety and learning about consent set the context of why it is so important to consult pupils on the content, relevance and delivery of the RSE curriculum. That is an increasing concern, as young people have easy access to smartphones and other devices. It is important that flexibility in our curriculum is not lost through an overly prescriptive approach that may not necessarily guarantee high-quality teaching and learning, and that knowledge and understanding are not confused with content. The challenge, therefore, remains to provide a curriculum that continues to engage with young people and reflect their views.

The Committee will receive a separate briefing from colleagues in the Council for the Curriculum, Examinations and Assessment (CCEA) about how it continues to support curriculum delivery through its RSE hub and an RSE progression framework that was launched last year. Supporting young people to build healthy relationships that respect diversity and self-esteem is vital. The Department remains a key partner in support of the Executive Office's strategy on ending violence against women and girls. Officials also attend the Gillen implementation review group, which the Department of Justice chairs. Significant work is being taken forward in the Department on RSE.

I reinforce the importance of ensuring that young people are supported to develop the skills and knowledge that are required to cope with life as a young adult. I hope that the Committee finds helpful the summary of the findings from the ETI's thematic evaluation, which is in our written paper for today's session. The Committee may recall that that paper was also included as part of the wider inspection paper that was provided to the Committee in June. The evaluation highlights the actions that are needed to ensure that children receive a high-quality curriculum offering for relationships and sexuality education that reflects the range of issues that face children and young people and that all young people are equipped with the knowledge and skills that they need in order to take informed decisions.

While I do not want to go into detail at this point, I highlight the fact that schools and centres should, with support, be able to provide pupils with access to a well-planned, creative, progressive and responsive programme of learning across the curriculum that is integrated seamlessly into the existing curriculum offering.

Thank you. I am happy to take any questions.

The Chairperson (Mr Mathison): Thank you. I appreciate your keeping well under time, so we have plenty of time for members' questions. That is appreciated.

I will begin by picking up on the ETI's report, which was specifically on the preventative curriculum. That set out a range of issues. My understanding is that a task and finish group was set up. Did that group ever report back on how the Department could begin to implement some of those issues? What was its conclusion?

Mrs Farrell: Absolutely. There is a task and finish group. Sam can pick up on the detail, but I think that the group has been critical to informing the guidance that I referred to.

Mr Sam Dempster (Department of Education): A key piece of work for the task and finish group was to develop the guidance, which we plan to issue this year. A lot of that work has been completed, and it is with senior management. We will then engage with the Minister on the guidance. Once the Minister has agreed it, we will share it with the Committee.

The Chairperson (Mr Mathison): So the work to move that report on to the next stage, which is to consider how to implement some of the recommendations, is very well progressed.

Mrs Farrell: The Department really valued that report, because something like 14,000 young people were involved in the engagement for it. It was really important, because it was a key mechanism for us to get those views from young people. Do colleagues from the ETI want to add anything?

Ms Elaine McAllister (Education and Training Inspectorate): As we said, that was well informed by the views of 14,500 young people. Half of those were from primary schools, and half were from post-primary schools, so we had the full age range across it as well. The voices of young people were heard, and they spoke clearly about what they want in their preventative curriculum, which is wider than RSE. RSE was, however, a vital part of it, and they were quite vocal about RSE.

Mr Dempster: That will be a key feature of the guidance. We will expect schools to not only engage actively with young people but reflect their views in the policy and programmes.

The Chairperson (Mr Mathison): I will ask a question on that. Linsey, you highlighted that there is definitely work to be done to support schools in responding to the needs of the young people who receive the education and to some of the concerns that teachers raised directly with the ETI. In many cases, they do not feel confident or equipped to deliver the curriculum. Can you give us any sense of what you think is the best method of supporting schools and teachers — I will even widen that out — and boards of governors to develop good policies? There is a lot to navigate.

We had quite a detailed discussion in the previous session about opt-out provisions and developing fit-for-purpose policies. It is about having really good, meaningful engagement with parents so that they are involved with and understand the curriculum that is being developed and about listening to young people. There are layers of complexity that we do not get with other aspects of the curriculum. Do you have a sense of where the support is needed and what it might look like?

Mrs Farrell: As with other evaluations that colleagues in ETI have taken forward, the key theme has been teacher confidence and the sense that teachers do not currently feel confident and equipped to deliver RSE. Investment in teacher professional learning (TPL) came up in Committee briefings previously, as did the sense from teachers that they need a continuous framework for and programme of ongoing teacher professional learning and investment in them as a profession. The Department is certainly looking at teacher education and professional learning already through its end-to-end review of school improvement.

You mentioned boards of governors. Obviously, they play a key role in RSE policies, and there is a need to build their confidence and skills in that as well. That is where the EA has a particular role in rolling out training to governors. There is also an important piece on amplifying and sharing good practice, because while we recognise that, no doubt, there is work to do, we also know from the work that colleagues in ETI are carrying forward that there are a lot of great examples of what good practice looks like. There is something about sharing that practice, which will build confidence across schools. My colleagues from ETI might want to comment on that.

Dr Fionnuala McCann (Education and Training Inspectorate): Developing RSE policy is a statutory duty that lies with the boards of governors and the principals. We see that being done effectively when there is consultation with parents, governors and pupils. It is really up to them to see what the progression is in that delivery across the school so that those experiences have breadth and pupils receive a broad and balanced curriculum.

In our evaluation, 96% of schools said that they were continually refreshing their RSE policies and that they had been updated in the previous two years. The preventative curriculum, which Elaine discussed, sits alongside that. Just over a quarter of schools were not reviewing it to the same extent, and that delivery area needs to go hand in hand with RSE provision.

Ms McAllister: On good practice, we had a dissemination event, and representatives from two schools talked about the practice in their school and how they developed their whole preventative curriculum. RSE was an important part of that. Part of the ETI's inspection model is about highlighting good practice and disseminating information on it. We will identify in reports which examples of good practice should be disseminated further across the system.

The Chairperson (Mr Mathison): That is great. I have one other question, and then I will bring in other members. I will pick up on some of the conversations that we had on opt-outs. It was very clear from the previous session that this is a really complex area. It is not straightforward. A lot of different rights and interests intersect throughout the process. As a Committee, we need to be really clear that navigating it is not straightforward, particularly for school leaders who face such issues.

Specific provisions were put in for the new minimum content, which came in through regulations earlier in the year. One thing that was highlighted was the provision for a slightly different standard to be applied for year 12 students such that the young person must not object to the opt-out. Do you think that there is enough space in that process to hear from the young person? I know that, with the guidance that came through from the Department, there is a pro forma letter that a parent can send indicating the areas for which they wish an opt-out, and they can then indicate that the young person does not object. Is there more that can be done just to make sure that we are balancing rights and that the child's voice is heard?

Mrs Farrell: Again, Sam will want to come in on this point. A huge amount of work has been done. As you point out, it is about balancing parental rights with the child's rights. The team spent a lot of time on that point.

Mr Dempster: Yes, and it will be reflected in the revised guidance that we are sending out, so we are taking the opportunity to reinforce that message. The reason that we chose year 12 was to do with Gillick competence, meaning that if you are 16 and above, you are taken as competent to make your own decisions unless there is evidence to the contrary. That is not to say that younger people cannot also object, but some sort of assessment needs to be done on their competence to make that call.

The Chairperson (Mr Mathison): The guidance provides some, I suppose, guidance, but will there be additional provision to support schools? There are difficult decisions in assessing level of competence, and you do not want to be pitting a parent against their child. For a school and a board of governors, that could become really complex.

Mr Dempster: We can take that away and look at it, and, if we need to strengthen it, we can. We can certainly look at it.

The Chairperson (Mr Mathison): I think that schools and boards of governors would welcome that, and I think that parents would also welcome it. Nobody wants a tick-box exercise that shows that the parent has spoken but nobody goes any further. It would be good practice for schools to open up a conversation at that stage in order to bring the young person in. That would feel like good practice to me.

Mr Dempster: Absolutely. As Linsey said, we want the guidance to be agile and reflect what is happening on the ground so that we can update it as necessary and reissue it.

Mrs Farrell: That type of issue comes back to teacher confidence, which is a key point. As you rightly said, Chair, the issues are complex; they are not straightforward. Even as we continue to consider the teacher professional learning and where teachers require that support, that is one aspect on which we will certainly engage with teachers in order to understand better how they manage engagement with parents and with the young people.

The Chairperson (Mr Mathison): Thank you. I do not want to hog any more time. Deputy Chair, have you anything that you want to come in on?

Mr Sheehan: Yes, I have a couple of quick points. The chief commissioner of the Human Rights Commission was speaking just you before you came in, and she said that, in some instances with the delivery of RSE, minimum standards were not being met. What are officials doing to make sure that the RSE curriculum is being delivered consistently across all schools? As an add-on, we have talked about providing extra support for teachers and so on who do not feel that they are capable of delivering that curriculum. Has there been any actual resistance from any teachers or schools to delivering it?

Mrs Farrell: Sam, do you want to pick up the first point? I can come back on the second one.

Mr Dempster: We will cover that in the guidance again by reinforcing the message to schools that they should be delivering at least the very minimum content, but, this time and for the first time, we have mapped across in the curriculum where very sensitive subjects can be taught. That provides the context of when it can be taught in order to help schools navigate through that issue.

Mr Sheehan: I will bring in ETI on this as well. You mentioned the ETI 2023 evaluation. It highlighted:

in delivering RSE. I suppose that this work has to be a joint effort by the Department and ETI. How will ETI evaluate the effectiveness and consistency of the delivery of RSE, given the evaluation that you produced in 2023?

Ms McAllister: In June, we provided the Committee with an update on our development of inspection approaches, and we are delighted to say that we now have a full programme of inspections scheduled for this academic year now that action short of strike has ended. The first inspections will begin on Monday. 'Empowering Improvement: New Framework for Inspection' was published and is now on our website. We will be able to monitor RSE as part of one of the core areas, which include curriculum for all, and health, well-being and keeping safe. Those are two of the four core areas that will be part of all inspections. The framework also sets out indicators of effective practice for each of those nine core areas, and schools can use them, as well as self-evaluation tools, to reflect on the practice. Health, well-being and keeping safe has a specific reference to RSE in the context of provision and effective practice. The document states:

As well as that, we look at school policies for RSE, and we will observe lessons in any related areas of the curriculum. We will also ensure that the provision and planning for the whole preventative curriculum in RSE is age- and stage-appropriate. We report objectively on what we find, and we tend, as you said, to find that there is a variety in the quality out there. However, we will challenge when the provision is not good enough.

Another change in our processes is that parents, young people and staff will have an opportunity to complete a confidential questionnaire, and we reviewed the questions on that. I have examples of those questions. A parent will be able to comment, "I am content with the RSE provided by this school". Primary 7 pupils can say, "I receive helpful information about the changes that will happen to me as I grow up and develop". Our teachers can say, "I have sufficient training and support to deliver the preventative curriculum well". Years 8, 9 and 10 can report, "My school provides relationships and sexuality education, which I find useful", and years 11, 12 and 13 can say, "My school provides relationships and sexuality education, which I find useful in helping me make informed and responsible choices". As we now engage in a full inspection programme and will have the answers from those questionnaires coming in from every inspection, we will, after a period of time, be able to monitor the answers to those questions, and that will give us some system-wide data on how well things are going, as well as information on individual schools. We have also widened our engagement with young people during inspection. We now meet years 3, 5 and 7 in primary schools and larger groupings of pupils in post-primary schools. Those conversations give us opportunities to explore the matter with the young people, especially given their written comments on our questionnaires, so that we can find out what it is like in their school and how respectful the relationships are in their school for all types of pupil. We feel that we will be in a good position to report on what is going on in the system, and, hopefully, we will see things improve.

Mr Sheehan: The other part of the question was about resistance from schools or individual teachers. How will that be dealt with by, first, the Department and, secondly, the ETI?

Mrs Farrell: When we engaged with schools on, for example, the Secretary of State's changes to legislation, it was clear that, for a variety of reasons, there was a nervousness among some schools and a concern among some teachers about the changes that were being brought in, but it became clear that those schools that demonstrated really effective practice were those that were able to manage that internally. Again, there is a core piece about building confidence in how this can be managed in a way that fits the context and the ethos of the school. Schools have done that before, and colleagues talked about the event at which good practice was shared. Schools spoke very openly about how they had to deal with differing views among staff on the issues. That is a core piece of it.

I will go back to your previous point, Pat. Inspection will be a key aspect that has been missing for us on quality assurance at a system level, but you will also know that the Department is required to report to the Assembly on the specific changes that the Secretary of State made. That report will be laid before the Assembly by 1 September 2026. Work is ongoing to develop a questionnaire for schools to help inform that report. I know that that is specifically linked to the Secretary of State's changes, but, within that, we also want to understand how schools are approaching the development of their RSE policy, so that will be another key piece in that.

Mr Sheehan: Thank you.

Mr Dempster: May I add just one point? We have also been working with CCEA to develop exemplars. CCEA has developed three so far — one for post-primary schools, one for primary schools and one for special schools — that it hopes to publish on its RSE hub soon, and it will develop more for us. Those are examples of very good practice.

Dr McCann: I will add that we sent questionnaires to 509 schools and centres, which completed them. In the additional written comments, there was nothing about the teaching or any aspect that people did not want to teach. The comments were largely about confidence and the supporting TPL. It is therefore difficult to separate that part from the minimum delivery content. Teachers want to increase their confidence to deliver and to give the children factual information to facilitate discussions, which are an important part of the learning.

Mr Baker: I will return to the views of our young people. Can you elaborate on what has come out of the findings? No matter what engagement I have had, whether at a youth club or when I was a Belfast city councillor and was on the people and communities committee, or even when Robbie and I were at the Youth Assembly, the kids are very vocal about some subjects, which are mental health, RSE and, in particular, the teaching of what they would like to see in the curriculum, such as the rights of LGBTQ+ children. I know that it is in the report, but I want you to elaborate on some of the views.

Ms McAllister: I will say something, and you can come in after, Fionnuala. One thing that came across in the young people's views was that, when such discussions in class are not handled sensitively or are handled badly, young people end up feeling that their sexuality is being discussed in a certain way. There, we are talking about teachers feeling that they do not have the skills to know how to handle the situation.

Young people told us clearly that they wanted a preventative curriculum in the round: for it to be delivered across the curriculum. They wanted it to be cross-subject, not stand-alone, but they also wanted it to be normalised and to have a safe space in which they could get scientifically accurate knowledge from teachers who are confident. Some of them said, "I don't want my teacher standing nervously at the top of the class, handing out worksheets and not being willing to talk about this". They wanted their teachers to be able to talk to them normally, and therefore to normalise it for them. That was huge for them and came across very strongly in their views.

Dr McCann: We took the views of primary-school and post-primary-school children. Some of the primary-school children wanted to know more about gender and identity. That was the P7 children who, largely, filled in the evaluation for us. In post-primary schools, issues around consent and, in particular, child sexual exploitation (CSE) came through as strong themes.

As Elaine said, it is about discussion. Pupils really want to be active and have their views sought and heard by the school, but that is happening for only 50% of them, which is a concern. There is a credibility issue. If we say that education is for children and young people but then do not listen to their views of what that education is like and their experience of it, that may appear to be short-changing them a bit.

Mr Baker: That gets fed in to us quite regularly.

Mr Dempster: I will tell you something else. In the engagement that we had with young people over the summer, they were more interested in having healthy, happy relationships than in the sexuality bit. They told us that, if they had happy relationships, the sexuality bit almost looked after itself, because it was no longer an issue for them. That was quite interesting to hear.

Mr Brooks: I have probably heard plenty about what I was going to ask from elements of answers to the questions that have already been asked.

I will ask you to reflect on the methodology, its positives and what you think can be learned for the future. I will do that because, in this Committee, we place quite a focus on listening to the young people's voice and allowing it to influence policy. We will probably have differences around the table on the balance to be struck between the young people's voice being heard and that of parents and schools.

If we are going to hear the young people's voice — I have had discussions with some Youth Assembly Members and others — it is important that those voices be reflected accurately as being representative of their generation in a way in which, I feel, the organisations that we engage with are not necessarily always representative of that. I say that as someone who would probably have been quite keen to be involved in something like the Youth Assembly. Its Members are people who are already quite politically engaged and strongly opinionated. In my experience, from growing up myself and from relatives, they do not reflect all members of that generation.

The nature of the Department and of schools allows you to do the kind of work in which you get a much broader view and engage with many more young people, with a variety of views, including young people who really need a more proactive effort to be made to involve them and hear from them. If they are just asked whether they want to be involved, they will say, "No, that's not for me" and will leave it to the people who have already been engaged. Something that worries me when we are trying to listen is that we hear young voices but not the right variety of young voices. That is a good methodology. Perhaps you can talk about its benefits for your work and how it could be improved.

Mrs Farrell: I am sure that ETI colleagues will want to come in on that, given the focus on the voice of the child and the young person through its work. There is, however, a broader point to be made about engagement more generally. It is always important, no matter what group we engage with, that we get as representative a sample as possible. With some of the timelines — for example, for the Secretary of State's changes — there was a pragmatism involved in trying to engage as broadly and intensively as possible within a very tight timescale. There is a broader point for us about having an inclusive approach to how we do that. That is where the ETI approach is excellent, as its approach provides insights that many of us will never have the opportunity to get. The ETI can get access so many young people and schools across Northern Ireland. It is something on which we will reflect. There is work going on in the Department — for example, on how we use the Lundy model in engagement with children and young people — to ensure that the voice of the child and the young person informs policy and service delivery. There are therefore issues for us to reflect on. I am sure that ETI colleagues will have a lot more to say.

Dr McCann: Our questionnaire was large-scale, with 14,665 responses to it. That reinforces and speaks to the need for schools to know their context and to know their own pupils, who will be recipients of the programme. That is not a hard task, and, to get a representative sample, you are right: voice can seem to speak to the singular, but there is a plurality of identities that need to be considered. For me, it is about how the school involves its pupils and, equally, their parents. I know from engagement with parents of pupils at special schools that, where teachers lack confidence, they also lack confidence, and they want to see what the curriculum looks like so that they can support its delivery.

As with all things, there is a need to balance all views, but that needs to be underpinned by a safe space, regardless of ethos, where children feel that they belong and where diversity is accepted and is of an inclusive nature. If that underpins it, it can deliver only positive results for pupils. Again, a key question is this: what is the learning environment like for pupils? What is the ethos when it comes to relationships with their teachers? Is there trust? A lot of it is about safeguarding our young people and teaching them protective behaviours, but it is about much more than physical safety. Our children need to feel emotionally and psychologically safe so that they can ask those questions of their teachers. Many of them do so, and many of our teachers try hard to provide the responses. A whole culture needs to be brought in.

Mr Brooks: That is one of the things that I noted. When you engage with kids, how do you ensure that you do it in such a way that they are not subject to peer pressure or groupthink because they are sitting beside their friends who think differently from them or because they think that they have to be seen in a certain way? If we are going to engage with young people and use them for policymaking, we have to make sure that we get it right. It cannot be about — I think that we are all guilty of this at times — finding the young people who suit us and seeing whether they will say what we want them to say. That model is probably the best that I have seen. As a unionist, I think that it will be interesting to look into the Lundy model. [Laughter.]

Mr Butler: Could you change the word "Lundy"? [Laughter.]

Mr Dempster: We did not choose it. [Laughter.]

Mr Butler: We thought that she was talking about you, David.

The Chairperson (Mr Mathison): Moving swiftly on —.

Mr Baker: When I go back to the young ones, I will remind them of what you said.

Mr Brooks: I have had that chat with them. They were interested.

Mr Baker: I am telling you: I cannot wait.

The Chairperson (Mr Mathison): Moving on. Robbie, you are next.

Mr Butler: Thank you.

The Chairperson (Mr Mathison): I ask members to get to questions quickly so that we can hear the answers as fully as possible.

Mr Butler: Some of my questions have been covered. Perhaps the Committee would be better at refreshing my memory of this, but, when the Human Rights Commission was in, I felt that, at one stage, it called into question the veracity of the size, scale and content of the report from the ETI and the Department. I wrote that down. There was a response to one part, and I have never known a response on that scale: over 14,500 young people alone, which is remarkable.

I do not know whether this is in the report, but, on a point that Danny made, would it be easy to pick out, say, the number-one issue, the number-two issue, the number-three issue and the number-four issue, and present them as such? The voice of young people is going to be really important in this. If we get to develop our own minimum content, it will make young people comfortable and perhaps help debunk the opt-out argument, which, at the moment, is potentially the most difficult argument to have. It is the one that we keep coming back to, but it would be good if there were confidence that the report does contain the rights and views of all, because abortion is a contentious issue. Whether people believe it to be or not, it just is.

Ethos is another issue, Sam. I am not sure whether you want to speak to that. Everybody talks about respecting ethos, and that is OK as long as you respect mine, because we all have different ethe. Even on boards of governors in schools, they wrestle with the issue. I am not sure that a school with a single ethos even exists, because there will be those battles.

Is there a way of truncating the whole thing? For me, it is about the voice of young people and about mitigating, as far as possible, the number of opt-out difficulties that there will be, especially at Key Stages 3 and 4, when we get to that minimum content that the Secretary of State —.

Mr Dempster: The opt-out is specific to the Secretary of State's changes. There seems to be myth out there that there is a general opt-out for parents, and that is not the case. The statutory opt-out refers simply to the changes made by the Secretary of State. We are aware that there may be local arrangements whereby parents may decide that their child will opt out of certain classes, but there is no general opt-out from RSE.

Mr Butler: I know that. This is the point that I perhaps got to with the Chair, which is that the voice of the child seems to be important in every realm and facet of life.

Mr Dempster: One hundred per cent.

Mr Butler: Although it is important up a point, it is perhaps not important on an issue such as abortion. The position of the Human Rights Commission is that, if it is in the minimum content, the child should not be allowed to opt out.

Mr Dempster: That is where having flexibility in the curriculum is so helpful for us, because we can react to what pupils tell us they want. If you go into a typical class of 30 kids in a post-primary school, you are going to have a whole range of views, backgrounds, ethnicities and everything else, so it is important that the curriculum be flexible, and I can reflect that, which is why we do not want to overprescribe content.

Mr Butler: You talked about CCEA being close to providing exemplars, possibly. Will they include lesson plans, or is that —?

Mr Dempster: CCEA already has those on its RSE hub.

Mrs Farrell: It developed the progression framework and resources on its RSE hub, so that is all in place.

Mr Dempster: CCEA is in after us, so it will be able to expand on that.

Mrs Farrell: It will be able to talk about that in more detail.

Mr Butler: The crucial thing is to know that it is being done uniformly across Northern Ireland. The particular difficulty in the past, as Danny pointed out, is around the identity piece and LGBTQ+. Young people have suffered horrendously over the years, because, in some schools that has been handled well and in some it has not. I take it that the ETI's role on the other side will be to promote that. It is about trying to bring people with us, however, as opposed to the ETI coming in and —.

Mrs Farrell: It very much comes back to building teachers' confidence and skills. All of this has been done in the context of a protracted period in which teachers told us that they felt that there was a dearth of teacher professional learning and investment in skilling them up in their profession. Although there are particular issues with RSE, that is certainly something that we hear about for other aspects of the curriculum. So many aspects point back to building that strong, confident, well-equipped workforce. If that is being done in tandem with boards of governors, it is building a resilience and a confidence into the system so that it does not have to come down to the ETI coming in and pointing out where there are issues. Rather, schools, teachers and boards of governors will be confident and fully aware of their responsibilities in legislation and therefore feel equipped to deliver on those responsibilities.

Mr Butler: My final piece —.

The Chairperson (Mr Mathison): You need to be fast, because we need to bring in everybody else.

Mr Butler: There was this journey until the Secretary of State's changes. There was then a deluge of misinformation, which was really hard to deal with. It pitted people against people, when that did not need to be the case. It was horrible. I get the sense that that is possibly starting to happen again. Is the Department aware of anything? Is it concerned about anything? If so, has that been dealt with, and how will it deal with it in future to ensure that there is confidence for parents, pupils and teachers?

Mr Dempster: We have had correspondence on some issues that came up last summer, although nothing to the extent of last summer, when we had 13,500 responses to our consultation. It is always there in the background, however, and we are always conscious of it.

Mrs Farrell: The misinformation was unhelpful, because this is a very sensitive area for many people. There are so many views in any one room at any one time that there will be a variance, and that was why the Department decided to write to schools setting out a clear position to debunk some of the misinformation. It is important that information on the issue be clear and that, where there is misinformation, which makes the debate very unhelpful, it be put to bed. The Department had dealt with it at the time.

Mr Butler: Thank you, Chair.

The Chairperson (Mr Mathison): Cathy has indicated to come in next. I have shown a fair bit of latitude by allowing long preambles to a lot of the questions. That means that we are now under pressure to bring in everyone and hear answers to questions. From here on, can members cut out the preamble and get to their questions? If we are going to have three evidence sessions a meeting on RSE, we need to get to the questions more quickly.

Mrs Mason: Thank you for your presentation. One of the keywords that the Human Rights Commission mentioned earlier when dealing with misinformation was "communication". You mentioned the revised guidance. It will be difficult for schools to revise their policies. We can see that with the mobile phones policy at present. What support is the Department planning for when the revised guidance is issued? What support will there be for schools and boards of governors to revise their policies and effectively communicate them to parents?

Moreover, in the Human Rights Commission's report, there is a reference to children and young people wanting to have teachers who have chosen to teach a subject and are passionate about it, in the same way in which maths teachers may be passionate about their subject. There is also a question about external providers. What ongoing work is being done with, for example, teacher training colleges?

Mr Dempster: On your first point, I will say that school leadership is very important. The Education Authority has a programme to train boards of governors. It covers the entire curriculum provision, including RSE. The roll-out of that training formed part of the work of the task and finish group that was established. The EA provides school improvement practitioners, who go into schools to provide support for school leaders and teachers, and that work is ongoing. The EA may expand on that later this afternoon in Committee.

The Chairperson (Mr Mathison): Cathy's second question was about who should deliver RSE and what young people are asking for in that space.

Mrs Farrell: Cathy's point about young people wanting a passionate and enthusiastic teacher came through very clearly in the schools that have been used as exemplars of good practice. The leadership in those schools said that there was already a teacher in place who was confident and passionate about teaching the subject, had driven it in the school and built the confidence of others, and that is an important point to get across.

External providers are an important part of the central tenet of our education system, which is that schools have the flexibility to adapt their curriculum and use whatever resources suit the context of the school and the children. That includes bringing in external providers.

Is your point about the initial education of teachers about ensuring that newly qualified teachers are appropriately trained?

Mrs Mason: Yes.

Mrs Farrell: Again, that is a broader issue, and we have set up a strategic engagement group in the Department with the higher education institutions (HEIs) that deliver the important initial teacher education. I am more than happy to take the issue away and talk to the HEIs about it. We have broader conversations with them about SEN and other issues. The teacher confidence issue overall, not just for RSE, is an important conversation that we should be having with the HEIs about how to best do that in a teacher's initial education, while recognising that, as with any profession, any graduate teacher is not the finished article. There will be a need for ongoing investment in teacher professional learning to build on teachers' initial education before they qualify.

Ms Hunter: Thank you all very much for being here. I have two questions, one of which I asked the Human Rights Commission. It is about the reach that the Department has with RSE for children in Northern Ireland who are homeschooled. It said that every child has a right to that education. I have spoken with a number of mothers who have not been able to secure a school place for their children, and I know of some parents who have pulled their children from school in the meantime, while they seek a placement. What oversight does the Department have in that regard? I respect the fact that you may not have an answer to provide today.

Mr Dempster: The Education Authority has a role to play when it comes to children who are homeschooled. Most parents register their child with the Education Authority, and it will provide support, but we will take that question away, look at it and come back to you.

Ms Hunter: I am mindful that they may fall through the gaps.

Mrs Farrell: We will take that away and come back to you.

Where children are still waiting for a school placement, or where that is being worked through, particularly if the children have special educational needs, the Education Authority has assured us that there are contingency arrangements in place for those children until they are placed. Again, we can take that away to determine whether specific resources are available to support those children while they are not in school.

Ms Hunter: That is great.

My final question concerns something that I read in our packs, where it is stated that teachers should enable pupils to develop knowledge, understanding and skills. It mentions self-awareness, a sense of self, healthy boundaries, challenging scenarios etc. What does the training for teachers who are teaching learning for life and work look like? Is it regularly monitored? How comfortable, or confident, do those teachers feel when delivering it? Some quite sensitive topics are covered.

Dr McCann: Our teachers can opt in to study LLW. Some do, and they have a specialism in it. Where it is part of discrete provision, that is due to the teacher's passion. They may be into a particular area and want to spread good practice among staff around that preventative curriculum and to capacity-build. In one of our prior evaluations, in 2011, we said, "It's great to have specialists, but it can undermine a whole-school ethos". Where you have staff who feel suitably trained, they are, as Linsey said, building capacity in the rest of the staff and the rest of the year group so that the knowledge does not reside in one or two individuals in the school. They are all subject teachers, but they are all teachers of children.

Ms Hunter: Thank you.

The Chairperson (Mr Mathison): Thank you all for your time today. No doubt we will see you in the weeks ahead to discuss a range of issues.