Ruairi Quinn (Dublin South East, Labour) | Oireachtas source

Relationships and sexuality education, RSE, is one component of social, personal and health education, SPHE, in the existing junior cycle. As part of the new junior cycle student awards, the National Council for Curriculum and Assessment, NCCA, is finalising its specification for a new short course in SPHE. The development of the specification, including consultations and reviews of existing data, is, therefore, based on evidence and best practice. The SPHE short course will be available to schools from September 2014.

Circular 20/14 clarifies the position for schools in respect of SPHE and other subject areas for the 2014-15 school year. Schools may choose to incorporate the SPHE short course into their junior cycle programmes either for certification purposes or not for certification. They may also choose not to offer the new short course and continue instead to offer the existing SPHE syllabus.

There are no plans to review the content of the RSE curriculum at primary level or at senior cycle.

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