Sexuality education in Italian secondary schools: practices, challenges, and pedagogical directions

This dataset includes anonymised quantitative data from a national exploratory survey investigating how sexuality education is implemented in Italian lower and upper secondary schools. The survey aimed to map teaching practices, time allocation, teachers’ perceived preparedness, school climate, inclusiveness (with specific attention to LGBTQIA+ themes), cultural and community influences, and existing forms of resistance or pressure concerning sexuality-education activities. The dataset derives from a structured online questionnaire circulated between school principals (“Dirigenti scolastici”) of all state secondary schools listed on the Italian platform Scuola in Chiaro. Principals were asked to forward the research invitation to their teaching staff. Participation was voluntary and fully anonymous, and no personal identifiers or IP addresses were collected. The dataset therefore contains only aggregated professional and perceptual information. Variables include: socio-demographic and professional information (gender, age range, subject taught, region/province of service); presence and structure of sexuality-education activities; time allocated to sexuality education in the school year; perceived importance and curricular status of sexuality education; participation in training activities and perceived preparedness; school climate and organisational support; inclusiveness and attention to LGBTQIA+ contents; cultural influences and forms of resistance; aims attributed to sexuality education. The dataset is provided in its fully anonymised form and may be used for secondary analyses, replication studies, comparative research, and meta-analyses on sexuality education, inclusive teaching practices and educational policy in Italy. Due to ethical and privacy reasons related to sensitive topics, access to the full dataset is restricted and can be granted upon reasonable request to the corresponding author.