In 2019, the Regional Council of Navarre received an award and €50,000 from UNESCO for its pioneering educational programme “Skolae: Common Journey—An Equal Upbringing”. [1] The programme, which officially aims to achieve a more just and equal society, is in fact a sex education programme for young children.

Since its inception in 2017, thousands of teachers have been trained within the programme, which has now been extended to all schools in the region. “Teachers have noticed that children now openly talk about what they previously considered taboo or difficult to discuss,” boasts a Skolae coordinator. [2]

The programme that encourages children between 0 and 6 years old to play erotic and sexual games and that promotes sexual curiosity is justified by a “recognition of children’s sexuality from birth, which needs to be decriminalized and experienced in school and family.” [3 p. 68]

A practical exercise for 6–9-year-olds is instructed as follows: “The teacher names each part of the body and invites the children to rest their hands on, touch or caress it. Ask them to pause for a moment with their eyes closed so they can feel the emotions that come to them. Encourage the children to examine how they can touch each part of the body mentioned: open and close hands, move fingers, hug themselves, open and close their mouths, stick out their tongues. We are supposed to play with every part of our body.” The exercise ends with the children tickling or massaging each other. [4]

According to this programme, children from the age of 12 should answer questions about anal intercourse and what sexual orientations people usually have who prefer them. In a questionnaire, the school requires the children to answer the questions “How many people of the same sex are attracted to me right now?” and “How many people of the opposite sex are attracted to me right now?”

Representatives of Concapa [5] and other parents’ associations sued the regional board when they discovered that they had surreptitiously introduced the Skolae programme “completely without regard for the families. No one knew about the programme until reports of erotic playing cards for children from 0-6 years old appeared in the media.” “When parents and teachers gained access to the programme, they realized it contained a hidden gender ideology.” The program “reduces love relationships to an opportunity to gain sexual satisfaction and affection. Responsibility, family formation and marriage are words that are conspicuously absent in the 100-page document”. [6]

When in June 2020 the Regional Council of Navarre was imposed by the Supreme Court of the region; TSJN, to cancel the programme, they appealed the decision to Spain’s Supreme Court, which, however, sided with the parents and upheld the lower court’s decision. The day after the ruling, the Navarre Regional Council began to spread the idea that the Supreme Court’s ruling had no meaning because the Skolae programme was protected under a regional equality law from 2019.

Concapa’s spokeswoman expressed deep disappointment at “the defiance of the Navarre Regional Council against the Supreme Court’s decision” and warned that “the Regional Council is now preparing a new legal process to resolve the legal problems surrounding Skolae by provincial decree”. She pointed out that the programme contains “controversial topics that affect the most intimate parts of children’s personality, an area where families must have the final say”. “It’s said that the authorities should be at the service of parents, but with the Skolae programme, those roles are completely reversed,” she said. [6]

Professor Emeritus and Doctor of Education at the University of Navarre continues the criticism: “The compulsory Skolae programme, introduced in both public schools and independent schools, is intended to encourage children to discover their sexuality through “experiences of sexuality in the school setting”. With this purpose, “innovative” activities for children such as sexual play and masturbation workshops are scheduled. Curricula on the theme of love were constructed on the basis that “being in love is based on a myth of romantic love, which serves to perpetuate existing power imbalances.” [7]

Sources

1. A holistic program that removes gender stereotypes and creates an environment of equality for all ages in the classroom has won the 2019 UNESCO Prize for Girls and Women’s Education. The award-winning project, titled SKOLAE, UNESCO, https://www.unesco.org/es/articles/un-programa-holistico-que-desmonta-los-estereotipos-de-genero-y-crea-un-ambito-de-igualdad-para
2. Chivite receives UNESCO Prize for Skolae educational program, eitb, https://www.eitb.eus/es/noticias/sociedad/detalle/6730125/premio-unesco-al-gobierno-navarra-skolae-octubre-2019/
3. Schooling: A common journey—An equal upbringing, Navarre Ministry of Education, https://consejoescolar.educacion.navarra.es/web1/wp-content/uploads/2017/09/SKOLAE-Berdin-Bidean-Creciendo-en-Iguadad_Programa.pdf
4. EDSEXEPP-5 Our Body, Navarre Ministry of Education, https://concapanavarra.org/wp-content/uploads/2019/02/EDSEXEPP-5-Nuestro-cuerpo.pdf
5. Skolae program, Catholic Confederation of APYMAS of Navarre, https://concapanavarra.org/programa-skolae/
6. Navarre. Parents’ associations prevent the National Agency for Education from applying “Skolae”, which teaches schoolchildren about “girls with penises” and “boys with vulvas”, Hispanidad, 2021, https://www.hispanidad.com/hemeroteca/confidencial/navarra-familias-centros-publicos-concertados-piden-educacion-no-se-aplique-skolae-ensena-escolares-fichas-ninas-con-pene-ninos-con-vulva_12026685_102.html
7. Skolae’s indoctrination, Diario de Navarra, https://www.diariodenavarra.es/contenidos/participacion/cartasaldirector/2023/02/23/el-adoctrinamiento-skolae.html