We are delighted with the expansion we saw in the 2021/2022 school year in our Esteem training, network membership, and the number of young people reached.
We ran 9 accredited relationships and sex education courses, training 108 people, 101 of whom completed the level 4 accreditation in ‘Teaching RSE.’
During the academic year, our Esteem Network membership grew from 253 to 291 trained educators, exceeding our year-end target of 280.
One key to this success has been the continued popularity of our online training, which is providing access to many people who wouldn’t have otherwise been able to attend - including 13 overseas trainees.
The increase in membership is also having a positive impact on the number of young people we are able to reach together. Our end-of-year monitoring and evaluation revealed that the network reached at least 77,369 young people with quality relationships and sex education in the 2021/2022 school year - which is AMAZING! A record number for us as a network.
As part of our end of year survey, we always ask about the topics which have been requested and taught. Not surprisingly, for the second year running, sexual consent was the most commonly addressed topic by members of our network. As we continue to work with students impacted by the disruption of COVID-19, we were also not surprised to see emotional wellbeing being the second most addressed topic.
Once an educator has been trained by us, they have access to our Esteem materials and to support from Gareth, the Esteem Network Director. One of the things Gareth has continued in the past year has been the monthly online skills workshops. These have been extremely popular, providing both support and more in-depth learning opportunities to ensure educators are equipped with best practice in all topic areas.
One of our members (Kate from Love Matters) said about these workshops,
"I just wanted to encourage you with regards to the workshops, I have just rewatched the workshop you did on Child Sexual Exploitation as a youth group asked me to come and do a session on grooming. These workshops are a brilliant resource, thanks so much for your time putting them together and for the content!"