Mobile
Sexual Fantasies
Welcome to the 1950s world of CMS health education
Page 3 of 3
Mette Andersen, executive director of Time Out Youth, a Charlotte organization that works with gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgendered (GLBT) youth, says sex education that ignores sexual orientation "is very concerning to us, and it's also a big failure. It's devastating for gay and lesbian youth. When policies don't include GLBT youth, the message is that they're less important than straight youth. We've seen that it has the effect of increasing GLBT youths' isolation and it hurts their sense of self-worth dramatically. ... It's worse than a joke -- it's destructive and it hampers development."
Even though teen pregnancy and birth rates have been on the decline since the late 1980s -- in Mecklenburg County, the pregnancy rate among ages 15-19 has dropped 49 percent since 1990 -- a wide-ranging study of American teens by the Alan Guttmacher Institute in 2000 found that 80 percent of the decline is due to improved contraceptive practice. The other 20 percent may be attributed to fewer teenagers since 1990 having had sexual intercourse. Even after the past 20 years' significant decline, the United States teen pregnancy rate remains much higher than in Canada, England, France and Sweden, and 10 times higher than in the Netherlands.
No scientific evidence suggests that the sexual behavior of teens in abstinence-only programs is much different from that of other teens. A report on the effectiveness of abstinence-only teaching, which the US Department of Health and Human Services was supposed to release in 2004, has been pushed back to 2006. Several states -- Arizona, Iowa, Florida, Pennsylvania, Washington, Minnesota, Maryland, Oregon, Missouri, Nebraska and Texas -- evaluated the effectiveness of the federally mandated abstinence-only curriculum. Each found little evidence of success in impacting teen sexual behavior. A few of the evaluations show growing support among students for delaying intercourse, yet those students still had sex at the same rate as those who hadn't been in the program. What's more, students in the abstinence-only programs were less likely to use contraceptives. No evaluation was able to demonstrate a positive impact of abstinence-only programs on sexual behavior over time.
On the other hand, according to a number of studies including the Guttmacher Institute project, students in comprehensive sex education classes do not engage in sexual activity more often or earlier, but they do use contraception and practice safe sex more dependably when they become sexually active.
Time Out Youth's Mette Andersen says, "It's amazing what young people will do if you allow them to know what they need to know."
There are signs that many North Carolinians want a change in the way human sexuality is taught here. In February, the NC departments of Public Instruction and Health and Human Services released a joint, statewide survey of more than 1,300 public-school parents. Among the findings were that a majority of parents think the following topics, none of which are currently included in public school sex education classes, should be taught as part of the curriculum:
• Testing for HIV/AIDS and sexually transmitted diseases (88.3 percent)
• Use of birth control methods, such as birth control pills or Depo Provera (80.8 percent)
• Use of condoms (80.1 percent)
• Where to get birth control, including condoms (73.9 percent)
• Classroom demonstrations of how use a condom correctly (56.8 percent)
• Sexual orientation (77.7 percent)
Supporters of comprehensive sex education, led by the North Carolina chapter of the pro-choice group National Abortion Rights Action League (NARAL), pushed the State Board of Education to broaden the sex-ed curriculum. They didn't convince the board, but with the election of Dr. June Atkinson as the new State Superintendent of Education, the supporters are likely to try again. Atkinson ran as a supporter of comprehensive sex education. She could not be reached for comment.
CMS student Maya says she would hope a change to a comprehensive sex-ed curriculum would make a difference for students, "but it depends on whether the teachers would talk to students in an honest way about the way things really are today. Then it would definitely make a difference, because the way they do it now, leaving out people who are different, that's whack."
Josh is more cynical, "At this point, I don't really care," he says. "They made me feel so bad, I don't even want to think about it anymore. But I guess it would be better if it makes sex education more complete and they recognized that not everybody acts or thinks alike. But like I said, they lost me."
Speaking of 5.00000
-
A Family Affair
Dec 12, 2007 -
Darrell Roach
Dec 12, 2007 -
Body Talk
Dec 12, 2007 - More »
Latest in Cover
Calendar
-
Coveted Luxury Watches
- Mondays-Fridays, 9 a.m.-6 p.m. Continues through Dec. 30
-
-
AllMachines - Forklifts
- Through Dec. 30, 12-6 p.m.
-
-
AllMachines
- Through Dec. 30, 12-9 p.m.
-
-
AllMachines - Raymond Forklift
- Through Dec. 30, 12-5 p.m.
-
-
TheDiscountCodes
- Mondays-Sundays. Continues through Dec. 31
-
-
Lust List 2012: The Democrats
Who says politics can't be sexy?
-
The Story of Haylo, Time Capsule Tattoos and My Big Mouth 1
Time stamp
-
Where Has the Muckraker Gone?
Why one of the world's best investigative reporters can't get published in the U.S.
