Between Parental Rights and Professional Autonomy: A Content Analysis af a Handbook for Parents and Educators

Mojca Kovač Šebart and Mojca Lukan

Summary:  This paper presents a content analysis of the Handbook for Mothers, Fathers and Teachers for the Protection of Children from LGBTQIA+ Ideology (Primc 2024). The handbook draws the attention of educators in public educational institutions in Slovenia to the indoctrination of children and violations of parents’ right to ensure that their children are educated in accordance with their own religious and philosophical convictions. It also calls on educators to violate the law and disregard curricular documents. Our analysis focuses specifically on preschool education, partly because of the concerning findings of a recent study (Lukan 2024), which showed that educators in public preschools are often unaware that they are required to respect this parental right. They therefore do not know or understand what this right entails, nor are they familiar with its formal limitations. It is therefore entirely possible that the educational process and their decisions and practices are guided by appeals and messages such as those contained in the analysed handbook. Such conduct is both formally prohibited and professionally unacceptable.