The UNESCO (2021) paper on the inclusion of LGBTI students emphasizes the vital role of teachers in creating a safe atmosphere for all students, regardless of their gender identity, gender expression, variation of sex characteristics or sexual orientation. Additionally, the European Commission (2025) underlines the importance of safe and inclusive education in its current LGBTIQ equality strategy. In recent years a significant shift has occurred in the political and social discourse surrounding sex/gender diversity in Germany. Note: While some researchers conceptionally separate LGBT and intersex (Jones et al. 2016), German language uses the concept of Geschlecht (which I translate as sex/gender), a word that entangles biological and social aspects of body, identity, and role.

In 2019, a third civil status “divers” was legally established for intersex people. Since 2021, the “Law to Strengthen Children and Youth” has included the well-being of trans, intersex and non-binary youth in the “Social Security Statute Book VIII”. In November 2024, the “Self-determination Law (SBGG)” took effect, opening the civil status “divers” to nonbinary and transgender individuals. The visibility of trans, intersex and non-binary students and the thematization of sex/gender beyond the binary increased in science, society and schools (De Witte et al. 2022). However, these legal improvements do not necessarily translate into better conditions for LGBTIQ students and teachers at school.

Although Germany offers information, guidelines, support systems, and inclusive national curricula, there is no mandatory teacher training on LGBTQI awareness (IGLYO 2025). Teachers often feel uncomfortable or incompetent addressing sex/gender diversity in the classroom (Klenk 2023). They acquire Knowledge on the diversity of sex/gender through continuing education and advanced trainings at non-university educational institutions. At the same time, German schools are still structured around binary sex/gender norms in areas such as language, subjects, and facilities (Oldemeier 2021). Universities and schools also lack measures to protect LGBTIQ students, teachers, lecturers and staff from bullying and discrimination; currently violence against gender non-conforming students has increased in the wake of an anti-genderist right wing backlash (EU-FRA 2020; Grenz 2025). Additionally, teachers’ thoughts and actions are greatly influenced by every day sex/gender binaries, particularly in relation to intersex. Sex/gender categories traditionally refer to a binary understanding of both biological sex and gender identity in everyday practices of Western societies.

This complex situation provides the context for the empirical research project “Gender 3.0 in School”. The project focuses on the consequences of this transformation for the educational pathways of trans, intersex, and nonbinary students, as well as the current research literature, non-university training programs, and fundamental teacher education at universities (Busche/Fütty 2023). The project is financed by the Federal Ministry for Education, Family Affairs, Senior Citizens, Women and Youth (2021-2026). Our research within the project focuses on non-university teacher training programs on sex/gender diversity and education. We are interested in understanding the conditions under which these training courses take place, the strategies used to successfully expose and challenge social norms, and the areas in which the ‘field of sayability’ (Jäger et al. 2024) of sex/gender diversity is reproduced in a heteronormative way, thereby reinforcing it.

Our analysis of the courses revealed that many areas offer possibilities to challenge the discourse on sex/gender diversity and intervene in the hegemonic discourse on sex/gender (Götschel 2026). However, the topic of intersex is not. Unconsciously, teacher training courses in this area widely reproduced established assumptions and heteronormativity. Therefore, we will focus on teaching intersex in our presentation. Our study contributes to research on teacher professionalisation by showing how well-intended diversity training may simultaneously reproduce heteronormative knowledge orders.

The research design is a hybrid fusion of two methodological traditions: ethnography and discourse analysis. Data were collected in participatory cooperation with non-university educational institutions. We conducted participant observations in teacher training courses on sex/gender diversity, organized participatory transfer workshops with course instructors, and carried out expert interviews in the format of focus group discussions. This empirical corpus is complemented by selected observation protocols and audio recordings of training courses, discussions of preliminary findings in transfer workshops, and a broad range of course materials. These materials include teaching methods, games, presentation slides, brochures, and video clips, some of which were developed and circulated by educational institutions themselves. We evaluated the participant observations of the training courses on sex/gender diversity using Clarke's (2005) situational analysis. This method views training courses as “social arenas” in which interactions between participants, teachers, materials, and discourses generate meanings that reveal underlying “social worlds”. Focus group interviews, relevant course materials, and transfer workshops with course instructors were evaluated using critical discourse analysis according to Jäger (Jäger et al. 2024). This method analyses the “field of sayability” of sex/gender diversity. This is a framework shaped by social rules and power relations that limits what can be said or concealed about sex/gender diversity. Thus, it has an impact on teacher’s actions. In addition, we began a teaching intersex curriculum development project with the aim to avoid the reproduction of heteronormativity. We defined specific learning goals, choose relevant content, and planed instructional activities. We taught a six hours course on intersex in teacher training at Marburg University, and Helene will teach a 30 hours course on sex/gender diversity in Liberal Studies at the Institute for Key Competencies of Essen University in spring 2026. We will evaluate the curriculum by analysing the participant’s learning journals and using a questionnaire.

According to Butler (1993), speech and action are rooted in existing norms, and even their disruption contributes to their (re)production. Our findings show that teacher training courses reproduced heteronormativity—despite the best intentions. According to Hartmann (2020), it is therefore indispensable for teachers to reflect on their entanglement in heteronormative discourses and power relations. In the training courses we analysed, the reproduction of heteronormativity was particularly evident in the area of intersex—the biologically occurring spectrum of sex/gender diversity. Intersex issues played a significant role in almost all of the observed courses. Although course lecturers intend to provide body-positive information about intersex people, we argue that they are unsuccessful. Rather than teaching that intersex people exist and that natural biological variation is common and acceptable, our analysis of the teaching materials and curse interactions reveals an underlying violent medical discourse about intersex conditions, prejudices, othering, pathologizing, dramatizing, and voyeuristic narratives about intersex peoples. Conversely, the historicity and criticism of the hegemonic model of a binary sex/gender order, as well as the social pressure on intersex individuals due to a binary sex/gender understanding, are barely mentioned. Positive role models, intersex activism, and the celebration of sexual variety are largely absent. This raises the question of whether it is possible to teach about intersex from a non-heteronormative sex/gender diversity perspective. Therefore, we started a curriculum development project to teach and learn about intersex as a normal and natural part of the complex biochemical and genetical process that creates a wide varieties of possibilities, rather than as a medical condition or illness. In addition to these biological topics, the course covers the binary understanding of sex/gender in society and the role of intersex activism. In the session we will present the findings of our empirical study and discuss our intersex curriculum.

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