A study of the perception of parents towards the implementation of sex education in schools/ Susiantie Abdul Karim & Shaira Adika Hussaini

Prior implementation, sex education has brought so much perception and speculation amongst every level of the society. In the planning, sex education is to be taught in schools in Malaysia by February 2006. Nonetheless, the implementation has yet to be conducted even though the date had due. The study examines the perceptions of parents towards the implementation of sex education in schools in Malaysia. A random sample of 100 parents inclusive of both parents from Kuching (urban) and Rajang (rural) were given questionnaires. Factors that might influence the perception or acceptance level of parents, parents’ level of acceptance towards sex education implementation, whether to implement sex education in single subject or to integrate it into other subjects and at what age levels should sex education be implemented were examined. The study has provided that religious faith, age, residential place and education levels, except for communication level do not influence the parents’ perception/acceptance level towards the implementation of sex education in schools. Meanwhile, surprisingly, both parents from Kuching and Rajang have high acceptance levels towards sex education implementation, and mostly parents chose sex education to be taught as integrated subject over to be implemented as a single subject. The study has also provided that most parents want sex education to start being taught at the age of 7-9 years old where they feel that at this age it is of reasonable to learn sex education in contra to learning it at a very young age. From the study, we have learnt that sex education in any way we see it, does brings about positive values. Apparently, through this study, it has depicted that most parents agree for sex education to be implemented in schools. The fact that Malaysian still regards sex as taboo may be seen as slightly off through the result of this study. Yet, a mass study throughout the country may be of useful in the efforts to get the big picture of what parents throughout the country really think about sex education implementation as this study that we have conducted is just a little piece of the big puzzle.