Kjersti Draugedalen

Empowering Educators - designing and piloting a prototype for interdisciplinary Relationship and Sexuality Education (RSE) training

Poster Session Abstract

Child sexual abuse is a global public health concern and a violation of children's rights. A growing share of abuse is committed by other children, termed Harmful Sexual Behaviour (HSB), posing complex challenges for professionals—especially in schools, where all parties are minors.

This highlights the need for primary prevention strategies tailored to educators’ roles, including Relationship and Sexuality Education (RSE) training. This poster presents phase one of a Norwegian public sector innovation project (2024–2028) aimed at strengthening systemic responses to HSB in schools through transformative safeguarding.

The project uses a four-phase transformative action research model to enhance teachers’ safeguarding roles and interdisciplinary cooperation. Phase one (2024) focuses on designing a prototype for interdisciplinary RSE training, piloted in three schools in a municipality in Norway. Drawing on the Transformative Paradigm and Design Thinking, the poster details the prototype’s development, integrating municipal initiatives, grounded theory, and teacher feedback to empower educators and foster cross-sector cooperation.

Biography

Kjersti Draugedalen is a senior advisor at the Family House in Tønsberg municipality. In 2023, she defended her public PhD entitled “Teachers as Human Rights Defenders: Transforming Teachers’ Safeguarding Role against Harmful Sexual Behaviour”.

Kjersti is one of the co-authors of the Norwegian school manual on HSB and has written a practical book about HSB and school responses with Helle Kleive. Currently, Kjersti is leading the innovation project “Improving safeguarding of children and young people through a more systemic cooperation in the prevention and responses to harmful sexual behaviour in school” funded by the Norwegian Research Council (2024-2028).

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