Today, while scrolling through Facebook, I came across a video discussing a very interesting question: Should people be required to complete parenting training or obtain a licence before becoming parents?

The idea made me stop and reflect as a parent in Australia: How is school supposed to help my children learn how to become parents? Who will teach them these things if the formal education system does not genuinely prepare them for that responsibility?

1. Looking at the Entire K–12 Journey: Where Does Parenting Education Fit?

From kindergarten through to the end of Year 12, students learn a wide range of subjects designed to develop their academic abilities, help them pass examinations, earn qualifications, and prepare for further education or employment.

But when we look at this entire educational journey, I want to ask one very specific question: Where does parenting education fit within the K–12 curriculum?

Teaching sex education, including reproduction, contraception, and safe sex, does not automatically prepare young people to become parents. Teaching someone how to prevent an unintended pregnancy is fundamentally different from teaching them what to do when a child actually comes into the world.

A child needs more than a safe birth. They need to be nurtured, protected, guided emotionally, taught how to build relationships, supported in learning how to resolve conflict, and raised in a healthy environment.

So, where do students learn the fundamentals of child development, children’s psychological needs at different stages, how to respond when a child struggles, how to set boundaries without causing harm, how to regulate their own emotions as parents, and how to manage conflict within a family?

If the answer is that these topics are merely incorporated into a few wellbeing activities, occasional life-skills sessions, or activities delivered at the school’s discretion, I do not consider that sufficient to qualify as systematic parenting education.

Mentioning a skill is not the same as teaching it properly. Participating in an activity is not the same as developing practical competence.

Content that exists only on paper, is delivered superficially, or depends on whether an individual school chooses to provide it cannot automatically be regarded as an educational foundation that every student actually receives.

2. VCE: The Academic Pathway Is Clearly Defined, but Where Does Parenting Fit?

In Victoria, I look at the very pathway our children are going through: K–12, followed by the VCE and the challenge of achieving an ATAR.

From Year 10 onwards, students begin to think more seriously about subject selection, further education, and their chances of entering university. When the ATAR becomes an important consideration, choosing subjects is no longer simply about exploring what interests them or what they would like to learn. Students must weigh up their abilities, results, entry requirements, and the advantages of each subject for their future pathway.

This creates a clear set of incentives: subjects directly connected to academic goals receive priority in students’ time, attention, and effort.

A student who wants to pursue a university pathway has to calculate their choices carefully. They may want to learn more about psychology, family relationships, child development, or life skills. But if these subjects are not part of the academic pathway they consider necessary, they must decide whether those subjects are worth the time and effort.

Meanwhile, VCE has clearly defined requirements and assessment mechanisms. Students must select subjects to complete their certificate and, if they are aiming for an ATAR, meet the relevant requirements. Yet parenting education has not been established as a universal, compulsory subject within that pathway.

VCE is clearly visible in students’ academic planning and future aspirations. So, where does parenting fit within that same pathway?

I am raising this question because K–12 represents the broadest shared window in which the education system has a structured opportunity to reach young people while they are still within formal schooling. Once students leave school, their pathways diverge. Some go to university, others enter vocational education, and many move directly into employment. Further learning becomes increasingly dependent on individual choices, circumstances, time, and financial capacity.

If parenting education is not systematically incorporated into this shared educational journey, when and where is it realistically supposed to happen?

Should we expect people to enrol in a separate parenting course after completing their formal education? Would many people realistically be willing or able to sacrifice six months of their time to obtain a parenting certificate, particularly when they are already trying to establish a career, support themselves financially, or manage other responsibilities?

Where would such a course be delivered? Who would design and teach it? Where would students gain practical experience, and how would supervised placements be organised? Would prospective parents be expected to complete placements involving children before they have children of their own? If someone completed the course but never became a parent, how would that qualification fit into their life? Conversely, if someone had children before completing such training, would the education arrive too late to address the parenting challenges they were already facing?

These are not simply logistical details. They expose a fundamental problem with treating parenting education as something people can be expected to pursue independently after leaving school. A voluntary, post-school course relies on people recognising the need, having the time and resources to participate, and being able to access appropriate training and practical experience. It does not provide a common educational foundation for an entire generation.

This is why I am questioning the omission of systematic parenting education from the K–12 journey. School is not the only place where parenting can be learned, but it is a critical opportunity to introduce that knowledge before young people enter different educational, professional, and personal pathways. If we leave the responsibility entirely to individual families or to optional courses later in life, we are effectively asking each generation to figure out for itself how to prepare for one of life’s most consequential responsibilities.

3. EQ Does Not Automatically Translate into Parenting Competence

It may be argued that schools already teach students to regulate their emotions, communicate, cooperate, resolve conflict, and build relationships. These are all important abilities, but they do not mean that students have been equipped with parenting knowledge.

Knowing how to recognise one’s own emotions does not automatically mean knowing what to do when one’s child becomes angry, frightened, withdrawn, or behaves in ways that are difficult to understand.

Knowing how to resolve conflicts with friends does not automatically mean knowing how to manage conflict between a parent and a child, where there are differences in power, responsibility, and the ability to protect oneself.

Knowing that empathy matters does not automatically mean knowing how to listen to a child without imposing an adult’s own emotions and assumptions onto them.

And knowing that mental health is important does not automatically mean knowing how to recognise harmful parenting patterns or how to change one’s behaviour when under pressure.

EQ is a foundation; parenting is a capability that must be applied in a specific context, with very specific responsibilities and consequences.

4. When Schools Do Not Teach Enough, Families Become the Default Source of Knowledge

This is the part that concerns me most when I think about my children’s future.

If schools do not provide a structured pathway for parenting education, where will children learn how to become parents?

In practice, many of our earliest patterns of love, attachment, communication, anger, conflict resolution, and treatment of vulnerable people are shaped by our experiences within our families.

This means parents become the default source of instruction, regardless of whether they have ever been prepared for that role.

Yet the previous generation of parents may also carry unresolved trauma, unhealthy communication patterns, and beliefs about child-rearing inherited from their own families. Many have never been taught how to regulate their emotions, resolve conflict, or respond to children’s psychological needs in an informed way.

This does not apply to every parent. Nor does every difficulty originate from trauma.

However, if the system assumes that each generation will learn how to raise children from the generation before it, the system is accepting a foreseeable risk: unresolved patterns may continue to be repeated, not necessarily because parents intend to hurt their children, but because they have not been adequately equipped with the knowledge and skills to do things differently.

This cycle cannot be addressed simply by telling parents to love their children more. Love matters enormously, but love does not automatically provide knowledge of child development, emotional regulation skills, or the ability to recognise harmful patterns.

If we accept that these skills can be learned and improved, why is teaching them still not considered a core part of preparing young people for adulthood?

5. We Debate Whether a Child Should Be Born, but How Do We Prepare for That Child’s Life?

In public and political debates, abortion often raises major questions about rights, ethics, and decisions around having children.

But after a child is born, another question is no less important: how well prepared are the people caring for that child to fulfil their responsibilities?

A child’s needs do not end at birth. Birth is merely the beginning of a developmental journey that lasts many years and requires adults to keep learning, adapting, and responding to changing needs.

So why is parenting knowledge so often treated as something each person can figure out when the need arises, rather than an area in which people should be prepared in advance?

Why must students spend years accumulating knowledge to meet the requirements for university entry, while foundational knowledge about nurturing and developing another human being has no equivalent place in the educational journey?

6. The Problem Is Not That Students Are Poor Learners, but What the System Chooses to Prioritise

A student may achieve excellent academic results, solve difficult mathematical problems, analyse complex texts, and meet demanding academic requirements. However, these achievements do not automatically demonstrate the ability to manage emotional wellbeing, build healthy relationships, raise a child, or resolve family conflict responsibly. This is not a criticism of students; they are learning what the education system has chosen to teach and assess. If essential human capabilities are not taught systematically, given sufficient time for practical application, and recognised as an important part of personal development, we cannot simply assume that every student will develop them adequately on their own.

Parents were once children themselves. And as a parent thinking about my own children’s education, I do not want to wait until my children have children of their own before hoping they will somehow know how to raise them. I want to understand who will help prepare them for parenthood while they are still being educated, before their decisions and behaviours affect another child.

 If schools do not teach these capabilities systematically, families may not always have the knowledge to fill the gap, and society may only pay attention after problems arise. Leaving such an important responsibility to chance is not a satisfactory approach.

People may disagree over which skills should be included or how parenting should be taught. But defining, designing, and standardising essential human capabilities within the curriculum is precisely the responsibility of our education system. The difficulty of designing a curriculum is no excuse for leaving an entire generation to figure out parenthood on their own.