Statutory RSHE impact: keeping more children safe through education

• Strong signs of improving standards since statutory RSHE was introduced

• Regular curriculum time and greater focus having a positive impact

• Though further improvement is needed so all children and young people benefit

There are strong signs of a positive impact and improving standards since a statutory requirement for schools to provide relationships, sex and health education (RSHE) was introduced in 2020.

A February 2025 report from the Higher Education Policy Institute (HEPI) think tank features Savanta polling of 1,105 university students. It showed nearly half (47%) feel well prepared for sex and relationships in higher education, compared with just 27% who felt well prepared when asked the same question in 2021. 

2024 polling of students by Censuswide commissioned by the Sex Education Forum also suggests recent improvements. 50% of respondents rated the quality of their school RSE as ‘good’ or ‘very good’ – up 10 percentage points from the  40% who said as much when asked the same question in a 2022 poll.

These trends point to a policy that’s working and offers encouragement to our national community of PSHE professionals putting it into practice.

Such improvements result in keeping more children safe through preventative education, given that:

• ‘children who are taught about preventing sexual abuse at school are more likely to tell an adult it they had, or were actually experiencing sexual abuse’ (2015 Cochrane review)
• relationship violence prevention lessons and activities can reduce all types of dating and relationship violence, including emotional, physical and sexual violence, and violence that takes place online (YEF toolkit research)
• evidence that school-based RSHE can reduce sexual violence and domestic violence (Goldfarb and Lieberman systematic literature review)

Like any subject, PSHE education (including its statutory RSHE content) can only work if taught through a planned curriculum of regular lessons. So it is no surprise that a change in focus towards curriculum time, and away from less effective models, coincides with improved standards.

A DfE commissioned independent evaluation of statutory RSHE guidance implementation by IFF found that 97% of those surveyed now covered statutory RSHE through 'Timetabled RSHE lessons including lessons as part of timetabled PSHE education' and that 'The guidance was broadly being used in schools, mostly successfully’.

Of course there are still significant improvements needed before all children in all schools get the PSHE education they need, and deserve, but these encouraging signs provide a good platform to build upon.

This will involve ensuring anyone teaching PSHE education can do so effectively and safely, with a greater focus on the ‘how’ instead of always focussing on ‘what’ materials they use.

Therefore, skilling up PSHE education teachers and leads is a key focus for us this year and the reason we’ve launched our on-demand training platform to help train numerous teachers within a school, while at the same time supporting teacher training providers to place greater emphasis on this crucial subject.