So suggests The MacKillop Institute, which has set out to change the situation. 

Partnering with the University of Melbourne, the Institute has developed a targeted training program that upskills teachers in how to prevent, identify and respond to escalating sexual safety issues amongst students.  

Called Power to Kids, it’s a response to a desperate and growing need in the system, the program’s national director Smeeta Singh says.

“We know that girls are twice as likely (to experience child sexual abuse), and we also know now that adolescents and children are inflicting the highest proportion of child sexual abuse,” Singh flags.

“So, when we think about the school setting and our educators, they’re really on the frontline of this crisis.

“The program has really come about out of that need, where we’ve been hearing from schools and system leaders and educators crying out for further support, crying out for professional learning in this space…”

Educators have also been asking for the backing of their school communities to allow this work to happen in the first place, she tells EducationHQ.

“…because talking about sex, talking about child sexual abuse, can be really challenging. It can be really uncomfortable for some communities.”

From harrowing – and sometimes tragic – sextortion cases involving children and online scammers, to prolific deepfakes and online grooming incidents, Singh says the ‘unknown and unregulated’ online world is posing shifting challenges for schools.

“We see increased access and earlier access to pornography. We see young people searching for information online and finding it in AI, on social media influencers, really unreliable sources.”

When students form ideas about what safe, healthy and developmentally-appropriate relationships look like from these problematic spaces, skewed and dangerous understandings can ensue, Singh suggests.

Child sexual abuse can take many forms, but can be categorised as contact or non-contact. Sexual extortion is an example of the former, Singh explains.

“So, we’re thinking about people who approach children, they kind of catfish them online and trick the young person into sending them images of themselves, and then use those images to financially extort them.”

This can also play out between young people in relationships as well, she says.

“Young people can send nudes, and then those nudes can find their way out onto the internet.”

Contact sexual abuse cases are more well known, she adds.

“So we can have young people who are groomed online or in person by trusted adults, or potentially by peers, who are also potentially being exploited by other adults and led into abusive situations.”

According to the Institute, one-in-seven minors are asked for nudes by a stranger online daily or weekly.

Focused on three key areas (child sexual exploitation, harmful sexual behaviour and dating violence), the training offers strategies to launch ‘brave conversations’ with students, while building knowledge around how to spot the signs of sexual abuse and how to safely respond.

Of the more than 3000 participants who have been though the program, 99 per cent report they now have better knowledge and feel more confident in tackling the issue.  

“The last part of the program is what we call implementation, so this is where we really support schools to ensure that all of those tools and strategies and skills that they’ve learnt throughout the professional learning phase can be sustained and embedded after the training is complete,” Singh adds.

“And we provide them with a range of tools that help them to monitor their progress and set goals, resources to help them engage the parent community, so that schools can continue to do this work long after we’re gone.”

Brave conversations are a focus of the training for good reason, Singh notes.

“It’s the term that we use to describe quite intentional conversations with young people about key sexual safety topics. And this can be done both in a preventive and in a responsive way,” she elaborates.

Preventative chats help to normalise sexual safety as a topic to be openly discussed, with concepts such as consent and relationship power dynamics broached with children, Singh says.

“It helps to remove the fear, the embarrassment, any shame and promotes help-seeking behaviours in children when needed.”

Responsive brave conversations, meanwhile, hone in on a specific concern.

“This could actually be when as an adult, you’re observing in a young person something of concern and it gives you a frame to raise that concern safely.”

According to the Institute, one-in-seven minors are asked for nudes by a stranger online daily or weekly.

In Victorian public schools, it says an average of six alleged child-on-child sexual abuse incidents are reported to police each week of term, with more than half these incidents involving children under 10. 

Former student Camille is one face behind the stats. At the age of 12, the Institute says she was a vicim of sexual abuse from within her own peer group. She didn’t know how to ask for help. 

When she started acting up at school, skipping class, and self-harming, she was rushed into the mental health system and medicated for anxiety and depression. 

“The teachers and health professionals around me concentrated on my behaviour. Looking back now, I can’t believe no-one sat me down and asked why I was acting this way! I couldn’t cope with the abuse and was crying out for help,” she recalls.

The now 27-year-old social worker is at present completing a PhD evaluating sexual violence prevention programs.

“My entire high school experience was overshadowed with the impact of what happened to me. There is still so much shame and avoidance around harmful sexual behaviour and children, and I want to see that change,” she says. 

“If just one person had recognised I was being abused and asked the right questions, I would have received the correct support instead of spending years being medicated for a mental health diagnosis that I didn’t have.”

She urges teachers to “know that this is happening around you, and quite possibly to the kids in your care”.

“Equip yourselves with the skills to intervene to help all kids involved and don’t be afraid to ask children difficult questions about what might be happening to them.”

The Power to Kids program launched nationally late last month.

According to research cited by The MacKillop Institute:

  • One-in-seven children are asked for nudes by a stranger online on a daily or weekly basis;
  • One-in-four Australian children experience one or more types of sexual abuse, 
  • One-in-six 9-12-year-olds have had romantic or sexual conversations with an online contact, and;
  • Some 48 per cent of boys have seen pornography by the age of 13; for girls, the percentage is similar by age 15.