Comprehensive Sex Ed: To Teach or Not To Teach

"The vast majority of U.S. parents, teachers, and leading medical groups believe that students should receive comprehensive sexuality education"(1)

It's been an ongoing debate of whether comprehensive sex education or abstinence focused programs should be taught in schools to children and teens of various ages. As Elizabeth Bosley mentions as she lists 10 reasons to support comprehensive education in schools, "Presumably parents and educators want adolescents to be as healthy and happy as possible, even if they're not managing to conform to the standard of behavior that those adults would consider to be the ideal"(2). In order for everyone (those who choose to abstain and those who choose to have sex or try sex) to get the proper information about STIs, contraception options, and the practice of safe sex comprehensive sex education is the only option to fully prepare everyone for any option they decided to choose.

What are some of the issues comprehensive sex education can better?

• More than half of all teens aged 15-19 years old in the U.S. have had sexual intercourse (3). In fact, according to Elizabeth Boskey, Ph.D., "1 in 2 high school students have had sex"(2). Whether parents and staff are willing to acknowledge this reality it is important to be aware that comprehensive sex education is the most fitting curriculum type for the statistics at hand. It is inevitable that some but not all teens are choosing to be sexually active regardless of if they are taught anything in sexual education but with the preparation of comprehensive sex education the teens would be equipped with the proper knowledge of safe sex practices, how to avoid or deal with STIs and so on. Abstinence only programs do not prepare teens for the alternative at all.
  
  

• Nationally each year, almost one million teenagers get pregnant, and more than three-fourths of all teen pregnancies are unintended (3). Comprehensive sex education can educate teens on the proper use and importance of contraception and the consequences if they are used inappropriately. With the knowledge of contraception options and availability unintended pregnancies could reduce significantly. Abstinence only programs do not mention contraception options nor do they inform students on the proper use and the severe importance of these practices. Students therefore are adventuring into actions and consequences they are unfamiliar with which could devastate their futures and lives in the long run.



• Annually in the U.S., three million teens are newly infected with a sexually transmitted disease, and one in every three sexually active individuals will contract a STD by age 24 (3).



• One in four new cases of HIV infection befalls someone younger than 22 years of age. (3). Comprehensive sex ed is the key to educating youth about the transmission and dangers as well as frequencies of sexually transmitted diseases, without this type of sex ed students are left with abstinence based teachings which frequently exaggerates STI and contraceptive failure statistics if they are even mentioned at all.
  
  

How is comprehensive sex ed better than abstinence based curriculum?

• In the Netherlands, France, and Germany, adolescent sexuality is regarded as a health issue, rather than a political or religious one. An overwhelming majority of the people and institutions in these countries support sexual health. In all three countries, but most notably in the Netherlands, teens are educated about safer sex and have access to both birth control pills and condoms if they have sexual intercourse.(4)




• Consider these simple comparative facts, According to data from the United Nations Population Division, the teen birth rate per 1,000 girls 15 to 19 years old 64 in the United States, 13 in Germany, 9 in France, and 7 in the Netherlands. (4)




• Teen abortion rates are also profoundly lower in Europe that in the United States. comparative data compiled by Advocates for Youth shows that the abortion rate per 1,000 women 15-19 years old is 17 in the United States, 7.9 in France, and 5.2 in the Netherlands. Additionally, in the countries studies, teens begin having sexual relations more than one year later than American teens and have fewer sexual partners during their teen years than their American peers. (4)



• For a third of our nation's public school children, sex education focuses on a single theme: no sex outside of marriage. Period. Some of these children hear about contraception in class, but only in terms of its ineffectiveness in preventing pregnancy and sexually transmitted diseases. Others don't hear about it at all--at least not in a class room setting. (4)
  
  
• With abstinence-only programs "sexually active teens cannot protect themselves from disease and pregnancy without full and accurate information about the transmission of sexually transmitted infections, their treatments, and the effectiveness of contraception" (4)

• Sexually active teens cannot protect themselves from disease and pregnancy without full and accurate information about the transmission of STI's and the effectiveness of contraception. Abstinence-only education programs jeopardize the health of sexually active teens and leave those who become sexually active at high risk for STIs and pregnancy. (4)

• One popular program for abstinence only education exaggerates condom failure rates, thereby minimizing their effectiveness in preventing pregnancy and STIs. (4)

All in all, as mentioned by The National coalition Against Censorship (NCAC), "Sex education programs that teach only abstinence fail to educate students about responsible sexual behavior and deny students their right of access to important medical information about sex. The abstinence-only approach has led school boards to censor material in textbooks. Furthermore, teachers have been disciplined or threatened with lawsuits for speaking candidly about sexual matters. As a result, teens are engaging in sexual activities without a basic knowledge of contraception, sexually transmitted diseases, safe sex practices, and abortion.".(5) Sex education that covers diseases, safe sex, and contraceptives helps everyone in whatever they decided to do in their life and prepares them for any scenario which is why this type of curriculum is better than abstinence based material taught in schools to the curious youth today. But it is important to remember that "a parent needs to be aware of his or her own family or religious beliefs and values and know their child's intellect and maturity levels"(6).

Sources/Links you might be interested in:

1. Abstinence-Only Programs Do Not Work. American Civil Liberties Union.
Teenage Sexuality. Ed. Tamara L. Roleff. Opposing Viewpoints®. Detroit: Greenhaven Press, 2006.

2. http://std.about.com/od/prevention/tp/toptencompsexed.htm

3. Abstinence-Only Sex Education Cannot Reduce Teenage Pregnancy. National Abortion and Reproductive Rights Action League.
Opposing Viewpoints: Teenage Pregnancy. Ed. Auriana Ojeda. San Diego: Greenhaven Press, 2003.

4. Sex Education Can Prevent Teenage Pregnancy. SIECUS.
Current Controversies: Teen Pregnancy and Parenting. Ed. Helen Cothran. San Diego: Greenhaven Press, 2001.

5. Abstinence-Only Sex Education Endangers Students. National Coalition Against Censorship.
At Issue: Teen Sex. Ed. Christine Watkins. San Diego: Greenhaven Press, 2005

6. http://www.essortment.com/family/sexeducationch_saqs.htm

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