The South Australian government has admitted it breached its duty of care towards a Year 9 girl after she and her classmates were allegedly taught about topics including bestiality and incest and shown pictures of transgender surgery scars during a “Respectful Relationships” presentation.

The Government is nevertheless defending a lawsuit brought by Nicki Gaylard, 42, who pulled her 14-year-old daughter Courtney out of Renmark High School in rural South Australia in April 2024 after her class was shown inappropriate and explicit sexual content without parental knowledge or consent.

The SA Department of Education and then-Education Minister Blair Boyer later apologised, saying the presentation was “not acceptable”, while Headspace, a youth-focused mental health charity, also apologised, pointing the finger at FocusOne Health, the local Headspace licensee.

FamilyVoice Australia is outraged by the debacle at Renmark High School, where year nine girls in a sexual education class learned about bestiality from a swearing guest speaker with no teacher present and no parental consent.

The media reported that:

Kristy Wundenberg said her daughter, 14, found the session “confronting” and “aggressive” and it raised topics they had not yet discussed as a family.

“They weren’t ready for half that content,” Ms Wundenberg told The Advertiser.

“It was gut-wrenching to have the innocence of my 14-year-old taken away.”

Students were also reportedly exposed to “graphic” images of adults who had undergone so-called “sex-change” surgery.

Some of the students felt so uncomfortable that they asked to be excused to go to the toilet and did not go back to the “lesson”.

The undermining of the role of parents to educate their children concerning sexuality is deeply concerning.

It’s outrageous that any school would overlook parental consent and allow an unsupervised guest speaker to swear and provide graphic details about bestiality.

Please send a quick message to Premier Peter Malinauskas, Education Minister Lucy Hood (cc’d to Opposition Leader Ashton Hurn and Shadow Education Minister Heidi Girolamo) calling for someone to be held accountable for this appalling incident.