Alberta’s red tape on sexual health education gets tangled

In September 2025, the Government of Alberta implemented the Education Amendment Act. This enacted new rules around gender identity and sexual health education in Alberta public schools. With this legislation, the Government of Alberta controls the approval of every educational resource on these topics. 

This new system creates a ridiculous amount of bureaucracy. Not only does it waste teachers’ time and money, but it also limits students’ understanding. 

Students have required written permission from parents to participate in sexual education for many years. But now, teachers also have to teach with only government approved resources, or apply to have a new resource approved. This can be a lengthy process that the government promised to keep simple, but still takes at least 90 days and does not guarantee approval.

This has prompted many complaints from teachers across Alberta. Most are worried that the resources will not sufficiently teach students how to navigate and create healthy relationships. 

Approved resources for teachers can be found in the very literally named List of Approved Learning and Teaching Resources: Dealing Primarily and Explicitly with Gender Identity, Sexual Orientation, or Human Sexuality.

This quite limited resource is surprisingly reader friendly for a government document. It has positive resources for healthy relationships and puberty. It expands on the importance of consent, but it does not mention gender identity or the 2SLGBTQIA+ community. 

According to this document, grade seven students can learn how to use contraceptives, but they are too young to learn about nonbinary genders or gay relationships. Students can reflect on consent and choice, but not the experience of going through a puberty that does not align with their identity.

The Alberta Teachers’ Association (ATA) have vocally supported students using their preferred pronouns and exploring their gender identity. The new rules force teachers to ask parents before they use students’ preferred pronouns.

Alberta’s education and child care minister has advertised that this system will ensure “age-appropriate” curriculum. But I cannot understand why the concept of gender is not age appropriate. 

If puberty is not outside of a grade five student’s understanding, the gender spectrum has no reason to be. Children can clearly understand the concept of gender. All this proves is that this policy is not about giving “age-appropriate” education, but spreading intolerance.

The point of sex ed has never been to tell the students what the “right way” to live is. It should always be to teach students how their bodies work and ways to maintain their health. 

By limiting the information available to students, we limit their ability to critically think and make choices for themselves. 

Egale Canada outlines how eliminating education about 2SLGBTQIA+ people also negatively impacts queer students’ mental health. When students are not taught how to deal with the stresses of questioning their gender or sexuality, they will not know healthy methods to support themselves in their journey.

Furthermore, students will not know how to treat others with respect if they are not taught about the diversity of the world.

Egale states that about 90 per cent of 2SLGBTQIA+ students experience verbal harassment in Alberta. This is because of their real or assumed sexuality or gender identity. This could be easily avoidable if normalized spectrums of identity in public education. 

Teaching students about the diversity in our world is the first step to stopping hate and discrimination. Because, to stop spreading hate, we must stop teaching it.