About
Askable Parents, Heidi Winig (she/her) We offer inclusive and comprehensive sexual health education workshops for young people and for families. We provide private consultations for parents and caregivers to support you to talk with your own children about these important topics. Lastly, we can provide guidance for parents to better understand the sexual health education being taught at your children's schools, and to help you advocate for more inclusive, comprehensive, and medically-accurate approach if needed.
Purpose
I have been involved in sexual health education since 1995. Over the years I have worked in schools, community, after-school and faith-based programs, for districts, universities and non-profits, both domestically and internationally. I have always been passionate about this work. I started being excited about puberty ed through teaching Ethiopian immigrant girls in Israel about their bodies, and training peer educators about HIV in the late 90s in Boston. Since then I have written curriculum, trained hundreds (if not thousands!) of educators and teachers, and now work with districts throughout CA to advocate for more inclusive, high quality comprehensive sexual health education. I decided to start my own business (still on the side of my non-profit work now) guiding and supporting parents and caregivers because I believe that while schools and community organizations have an important role in promoting sexual health of young people, parents are their children's primary sexuality educators and there is just not enough support out there to help parents do this well. I am loving teaching workshops for young people and their parents/trusted adults together. I strive to teach from an inclusive perspective so that all of my students and families see themselves reflected in the curriculum. I am also now a parent of two pre-teens and am loving (!!) this stage of life ;)
Expertise
I have many years of teaching experience K- college as well as experience working with families, schools, and districts. I definitely have my finger on the pulse of what is happening on a state level in CA and have many great connections in the field. I am doing tons of training online right now and can share what I've been learning. I feel that I work well creating comfort around important conversations for families, especially with families for whom comprehensive and inclusive sex ed is kind of "scary" or unknown. I am always excited to learn and grow in this field. I think this organization would be a place for me to share expertise as well as learn from others, and that makes me really excited and inspired! While I feel like I have great expertise on the content in sex ed, I have so much to learn about being an entrepreneur. I'm also really pushing myself to grown in content around racial and reproductive justice as it relates to sex ed.