Earlier this summer, we brought together a group of passionate educators, practitioners and researchers for the second meeting of our Reimagining Relationships and Sex Education trailblazer group. These trailblazers are helping shape the next phase of our work, grounded in the principle of safe uncertainty: an approach that embraces complexity, encourages critical thinking and makes space for young people’s real, messy and often contradictory experiences.
For the first time, we met as a unified group, bringing together school-based professionals and those working across wider youth, health and education sectors. The conversation was wide-ranging and rich, surfacing challenges, questions and creative possibilities for embedding safe uncertainty in Relationships and Sex Education (RSE) and beyond.
Some of the key themes that emerged included:
- Language and accessibility: While the safe uncertainty framework is valued for offering a shared language and legitimising reflective, dialogic teaching, there was thoughtful debate around whether the term itself is accessible to young people or best reserved as a guiding principle for educators.
- Building community: Participants highlighted the need for debrief spaces and peer reflection, particularly after engaging with heavy or complex topics. We discussed the potential for Reimagining RSE to host blogs, podcasts and informal learning spaces that tackle topics often silenced or simplified, such as strangulation, coercion and masculinity.
- Training and tools: There is strong appetite for practical resources—model scripts, adaptable session starters and training formats—that support teachers to work flexibly and confidently. We’re now working with members of the group to pilot a pack of ‘not’ lesson plans that take a safe uncertainty approach.
- Strategic action: We outlined short-, medium- and long-term goals, from responding to the forthcoming DfE RSHE guidance, to supporting whole-school cultural change.
These conversations continue to affirm the relevance of safe uncertainty for RSE, as well as in the context of the wider challenge of teaching in a world where young people face competing messages, conflicting values and fast-moving social change.
To read more about what we discussed and next steps, you can find a summary of the meeting here:
We’re excited to keep sharing updates as the work progresses. Over the summer, we’ll be releasing a series of explainers and blogs unpacking key concepts and practices from our forthcoming book Reimagining Relationships and Sex Education: A Safe Uncertainty Approach to Adolescent Intimacies, to be published by Emerald later this year.
The book marks a major milestone for the project. It brings together our research, practice insights and the voices of educators and young people to offer both a theoretical foundation and a practical guide for applying safe uncertainty to RSE. Designed for busy practitioners, the book includes real-world examples, reflective questions and strategies to support more dialogic, responsive and emotionally attuned approaches to teaching about sex, relationships and power. We’ll provide further updates as we get closer to publication.
We’re so grateful to our trailblazers for their time, energy and insight and we welcome others to join us in this journey. If you’d like to stay updated or get involved, visit www.re-imagining-rse.org or follow us on LinkedIn @ReimaginingRSE.