We learned from the weekly learning project that sex education is not taught equally to all teens. When reading about laws referring to sex education it was shocking to find out that in past years five states enacted laws about sex education in school and 4 out of five of them supported abstinence only education. Another shocking detail of some legislation is that they are just now having state laws to say that all information said in sex education classes be accurate. I mean seriously, states have to make laws telling schools that they can't lie to their students. How scary is it to think that when we were younger how much we look up to our teacher and adults as well as look for their guidance. We don't expect to be lied to by teachers, so how is that going to do any good giving them false information. I am assuming not very well. Now focusing on the states that only allow abstinence related education to be taught in school in my mind dangerous. In my opinion having students who have only been taught abstinence are more likely to have unsafe sexual experiences due to a lack of knowledge. It is important to have teens know that they have lots of options and that sex doesn't have to be an ugly topic. It can be discussed in a healthy way that is not promoting teens to have sex but rather be safe if they were to have sex. Also i think it is important that both public and private school have proper educational programs. Now i went to a private school and i was definitely exposed to what i thought was an accurate and informational overlook at what should be known about STI's, pregnancy, birth control, and i appreciated it. Its important that private schools expand past abstinence because it well known that more and more teens are experimenting with sec at early ages and are getting diseases as well as a high number of teen pregnancies. The National Conference of State Legislation states that " tree out of ten girls will be pregnant at least once before their twentieth birthday" as well as the fact that the United States hold the highest teen birth rate. IF this doesn't want to make you scream then i don't know what will. My hope is that if more and more conversation are had around proper sexual education and staying healthy then we can change these statistics. This is also why planned parenthood is such a good resource, they help for teens to be healthy and informed. They help to get girls to choose birth control and other preventive measure.We need places like planned parenthood to help assist in the fight against the spread of STI's and to decrease the percentage of teens who get pregnant each year. We can do this if we support the education of our youth.
Resources,
http://www.ncsl.org/issues-research/health/state-policies-on-sex-education-in-schools.aspx
http://www.guttmacher.org/statecenter/updates/2012/statetrends42012.html
I would have to agree with Emily about the state our or nations sexual education programs. I myself went to an abstinence based public school. My school did a very poor job of educating me on different methods of contraception. Most or time was spent preaching about celibacy and the general “plumbing” of the human anatomy. Studies have shown that the majority of parents would support a comprehensive based sexual education program within their child’s school [1]. The reason we do not see more of these types of programs are because parent fail to voice their opinion. Abstinence based program supporters are a minority but make up the majority of active voices to school boards. The answer is simple, parents need to stand up and voice their opinion.
ReplyDelete[1] Sari Locker, (2001) Sari Says: The real dirt on everything from sex to school. HarperCollins: New York.
The thing that I find interesting is that in many cases the reason for abstinence only sex-education is due to religious affiliations. The high school I went to was a bit unconventional in that it was four separate schools under one roof, on one campus, each having their own administration, while still operating under a general set of campus ideas. The specific branch that I attended was what you would consider more liberal and open to evolving ideas. Nonetheless they were required to teach abstinence only methods of birth control. When I asked my principal why this was he suggested that it was a district decision based upon the communities desires. Interestingly enough this is the same school district that REQUIRES females to wear dresses to graduation and also put us all in white gowns (nothing like virginal and pure angels, aye?). But, I won't get started on that. I also find it interesting that when you did request birth control (whether condoms or oral contraceptives, the only things they offered) you had to take a note from the school nurse and walk to the public library where the librarian had to retrieve them from a storage room. So, not only did they not inform you that birth control was an option, if you some how found a way past their trickery you literally had to walk a mile and a half to get the desired birth control. All of these things are just other examples of institutionalized oppression.
ReplyDelete