Parents still in charge amid health curriculum overhaul: premier

Manitoba’s premier pledges to continue allowing parents to pull their kids from health class if content — be it related to human sexuality, substance use or otherwise — clashes with personal beliefs.

Wab Kinew said Tuesday the government’s overhaul of phys-ed and health curriculum in Manitoba schools won’t impact the ability for parents to opt-out of a lesson and deliver material as they see fit.

“As a parent, you are your child’s first and most important teacher and that will always be the case,” Kinew said, surrounded by hundreds of teenagers on the football field outside Kelvin High School during an announcement Tuesday.

More than 100 schools are taking part in a voluntary pilot project this fall. It’s the first systematic review of this curriculum in decades. The changes to kindergarten-to-Grade 12 courses will be mandated to all schools in September 2028.

Lessons about setting boundaries in relationships, identifying online luring tactics and investigating the connection between exercise, nutrition and mental health are all new.

“No topic is sensitive if it’s something we’re discussing and teaching at an age-appropriate level,” said Lillian Klausen, president of the Manitoba Teachers’ Society.

Teachers and parents need to work together to ensure children learn how to develop healthy relationships and make informed decisions when an adult isn’t around to help them, Klausen said.

“As a parent, you are your child’s first and most important teacher.”

Jennifer Watt, an associate professor of education at the University of Manitoba, said she’d hoped government leaders would be braver and fully back the new curriculum.

“You can’t bubble wrap kids,” said Watt, a former English Language Arts teacher who now educates teachers in training.

“It’s really scary to be a parent and it’s really scary to think your kids are being exposed to opinions that are different than yours but… we have to face those fears and learn from other peoples’ perspectives.”

Watt is currently researching the K-12 school system’s role in combating violence against women and LGBTTQ+ people and consent education.

It’s critical that students learn how to set boundaries for themselves, respect others’ differences and consider the implications of gender stereotypes, she said.

Alberta recently started requiring schools to notify parents ahead of lessons that cover gender identity, sexual orientation and human sexuality. Parents are provided the opportunity to “opt their child in, rather than opt out.”

“You can’t bubble wrap kids.”

A born-and-raised Albertan, Watt said she’s been concerned other provinces would follow suit.

Manitoba’s curriculum must reflect current issues, trends and terminology, Kinew said.

“‘Transmasc’ and ‘non-binary’ and ‘gender queer’ — I don’t know what that all means so I, personally, welcome the help, in terms of starting these conversations at school,” he told reporters Tuesday.

A transmasculine person is someone who was assigned female at birth but identifies with a masculine gender identity. Transgender men, non-binary and gender-fluid people may describe themselves as “transmasc.”

Non-binary is an umbrella term that refers to an identity held by someone who does not feel they fall into a male or female category. Gender-queer is often used interchangeably with non-binary.

The father of three said these topics are raised at the Kinew family dinner table, noting he encourages other households to “celebrate the fact Manitoba is a place where everyone is respected.”

“I don’t know what that all means so I, personally, welcome the help.”

There are multiple religious schools, including one school on a Hutterite colony, participating in the pilot.

“There are many paths to the same goal,” Kinew said about how the province can promote respect for all residents, regardless of their identity, while allowing opt-outs.

An online petition calling on the province to pause the pilot, citing concerns about its changes to sex-ed and uncertainty surrounding the future of opt-outs, has collected more than 13,200 signatures in 13 days.

Supporters are appealing to the province to halt an “ideological effort pushing progressive world views on young minds.”

“There’s always going to be fringe little voices out there. Let’s not platform them. Let’s focus on what this is actually about,” Kinew said.

He said the overhaul’s goal is to encourage students to exercise every day, limit their sugar intake and spend less time on their screens.

The news conference was organized to announce the Premier’s Fitness Challenge, an initiative to encourage students to set exercise-related goals and track their progress.

Students cheered during the announcement, which also included an update about the start of construction on a new gymnasium and track at Kelvin.

The high school’s athletic director, Bruce Sirrell, called the timing of the renovations “extremely exciting” because of the imminent changes to Grade 11 and 12 phys-ed.

All high school phys-ed courses, some of which currently allow students to exercise independently and submit their hours, will be delivered 100 per cent in-person by the 2028-29 school year.

One Grade 9 student said she thinks all students should learn about all genders, bodies and consent.

“It’s very important you know what’s going on in your body and LGBTQ people do exist,” said Lucy, 13.

“I think it’s important for everyone to learn about it because if there’s a chance to opt out, there’s going to be certain people who don’t know certain things and then it’s going to be weird when the topic does come up and they don’t understand it.”

The former Progressive Conservative government abandoned plans in 2021 to introduce legislation requiring families be given a heads up about lessons involving human sexuality, substance use and personal safety.

The Sexual Education Resource Centre’s J Fiedler said sending letters home about upcoming lessons can be a progressive practice because “sexuality very often has trauma associated with it.”

“While the curriculum documents are available to families online, it isn’t always easy to understand what that means for what students will experience in the classroom. It does require more sensitivity than math lessons,” the program coordinator said in an email.

Fiedler said this content, however, should not be optional when gender-based violence, HIV, homophobia, transphobia and digital exploitation is happening in Manitoba.

maggie.macintosh@freepress.mb.ca