Sex Education in Schools

Sex Education in Schools

Sex education in schools now seems to be more and more of a controversial issue. People are arguing over what the curriculum should be in sex education, if it should be taught in schools or at home by parents and the main point of this paper if sex education is actually doing what it was set out to do. The idea behind this paper is to determine if sex education in schools really does keep down the amount of teens with STD’s or who become pregnant.

The definition of sex education according to SIECUS (2002) “Sexuality education is a

lifelong process of acquiring information and forming attitudes, beliefs, and values. It

encompasses sexual development, reproductive health, interpersonal relationships, affection, intimacy, body image, and gender roles.” Sex education discusses important aspects of reproduction, sexuality, and just growing up in general in a physical and emotional sense. One would have to wonder though; does sex education actually serve its purpose? Does it enlighten teens enough about sex and the consequences, to the point where you can actually tell the difference between those who are sexually educated and those who are not? According to a study done bye Coyle (1999) sex education no matter where, at home or in school, and no matter the program does indeed help decrease the amount of teens having unsafe sex. Based on information from that same study about 3 million teenagers a year get an STD, and roughly 10% of adolescent females ages 15-19 get pregnant every year unintentionally. In an article from The Alan Guttmacher Institute (1999) there has been a 20% drop in female pregnancies between n 1990 and 1997 and the drop has continued, they have stated that the reason for this i...

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...ow that sex education does indeed decrease the amount of teens who become pregnant and contract STD’s. There are a lot of people who choose to ignore statistics which state that they themselves and their children are at risk of getting a disease which would change their lives forever, or ignore the idea that their child could be having sex, and young teens who don’t believe they can get pregnant the first time having sex. Sex education informs and is an important part of a curriculum, just as much as Math and English, because an education is harder to get if you have a baby or if you spend a lot of time in the doctor’s office. Life is by no means over if a disease is contracted or if a baby is born, but it is defiantly life altering and it is by far

better to know and be able to protect yourself than it is to be sheltered from what a few people could find profane.