Reimagining RSE

Subscribe to our new weekly podcast series exploring how we can approach some of the most difficult questions in Relationships and Sex Education (RSE).

We are a small team of social sciences researchers at the Universities of Surrey and Bedfordshire, with over 20 years of experience in RSE and facilitating challenging conversations with young people and educators.

RSE is increasingly expected to respond to wide range of complex and contested issues like consent, online harms, misogyny, social media, pornography and emerging concerns such as non-fatal strangulation – which has recently been added to the curriculum. Many educators tell us that they feel unprepared and insufficiently supported to navigate these conversations.

Reimagining RSE is about doing things differently. We aim to support educators and practitioners with an evidenced-based approach to tackling challenging conversations with young people. We are not here to provide another programme of prescribed answers or tell educators exactly what to think or say. Instead, we want to support educators to create spaces where curiosity, critical thinking and dialogue can flourish. We call this a safe uncertainty approach: one that encourages us to stay open to complexity whilst remaining committed to the values of care, respect and inclusion. Rather than reducing complicated questions to simple messages, it creates space for young people to think critically, encounter different perspectives and make sense of the social and relational worlds they inhabit.

Throughout this series we'll be talking to educators, researchers and practitioners about what good RSE can look like in practice. We will be exploring some of the most challenging topics we all struggle with as well as issues of safeguarding, digital lives and what it means to support young people in an increasingly complex and pluralistic world.

Hosted by Dr Emily Setty & Jonny Hunt⁠, each episode explores a different perspective on these challenges. Our guests bring a wealth of experience from education, research, policy and practice, and together we'll discuss what's working, where the challenges lie, and how we might imagine better ways of supporting young people.

Whether you're an educator, parent, researcher, practitioner or simply interested in these issues, we hope you'll join us.

New episodes will be dropping every Thursday.

First full episode: Thursday 15th October 2026.

Production: ⁠Terry Lee from the University of Bedfordshire's Radio & Audio team.⁠

You can find more information about the project, our resources, blogs and upcoming events on the Reimagining RSE website. You can also ⁠follow Reimagining RSE on Linkedin.