Leading educationalist wants school children taught gender ideology

9th February 2023

A leading voice in sex education wants children at junior cycle level taught gender ideology, the controversial theory which says your ‘gender’ and biological sex are unrelated.

Dr Siobhan Higgins is a Postdoctoral Research Fellow in the School of Psychology, NUI Galway and describes herself as a “sexual health promoter” from a “sex positive” perspective.

Asked on Newstalk’s Breakfast show yesterday whether it was prudent to bring a matter of “heated public debate” into schools, she said, “Isn’t that a safe place to actually discuss these things, where we give our children a space, with information, non-biased information, to make informed decisions for themselves”.

She added: “SPHE [Social Personal and Health Education] gives information, SPHE isn’t biased, SPHE isn’t judgemental. SPHE is just trying to provide information to our children so that they can make informed decisions themselves.” Relationships and Sexuality Education is part of SPHE.

She continued: “Our SPHE curriculum as it stands is outdated and our children are finding information about how to explore their sexuality which includes their gender identity from other sources. And unless we provide from the school and from parents, non-judgemental information so that they can make informed decisions, they are going to follow people like Andrew Tate.”