Factors associated with middle school students' perceptions of the quality of school-based sexual health education

Abstract

This paper examines factors associated with middle school students' perceptions of the quality of the sexual health education (SHE) they received at school. Participants were 478 predominately White young people (256 girls, 222 boys) in grades 6–8 who completed a survey assessing their demographic characteristics; dating and sexual experience; and perceptions of the content, delivery and quality of the SHE they had received. Boys and students in a lower grade and with less sexual experience rated the quality of their SHE more positively. After accounting for student characteristics, students who more strongly agreed that their SHE matched their interests and covered sexual health topics more adequately, as well as who viewed their teacher as being more comfortable talking about sexual topics and doing a better job answering questions, reported higher quality SHE. Students' perceptions of the adequacy of coverage of 10 sexual health topics were also positively correlated with their reports of higher quality SHE, although only two topics (correct names for genitals and puberty/physical development) contributed uniquely to the prediction of this variable. These results reinforce the need for a comprehensive SHE curriculum as well as adequate preparation of teachers if SHE is to be engaging to students.

Keywords:

• sexual health education
• middle school students
• young people
• Canada

Acknowledgements

The authors would like to thank Mark Holland and Margaret Layden-Oreto of the New Brunswick Department of Education, and Alexander McKay of the Sex Information and Education Council of Canada for their help in the design of the questionnaire. They also appreciate the assistance of the Directors of Education for the participating school districts and the principals of the participating school districts. They would like to thank Tricia Beattie, Steven Jefferson, Chris Lee, Sheila MacNeil, Anne Moore, Laura Nichols, Heather Sheppard and Adrienne Wang for their help with data collection, and Krista Byers-Heinlein and Hilary Randall for their help with data entry and coding. Finally, they would also like to acknowledge the New Brunswick Department of Education for their financial support.