Comprehensive Sex Education - Press Release

First published in June 2007 - the information is still important.

It is vital for parents to know about the following press release so that teens will be taught the truth. As of now, Be the One’s abstinence-until-marriage curriculum is approved in Palm Beach County. Please be sure that your opinion is heard by community leaders by writing to, or telephoning your representatives.

HHS Report: “Comprehensive” Sex Education Ineffective and Offensive Programs Instruct Teens As Young As 13 on Sexually Explicit Material

Washington, DC – Parents today learned the truth about so called “comprehensive” sex education curricula from a US Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) study. The government report reveals how the most commonly used sex education programs have virtually no effect in keeping teens from having sex yet contain numerous sexually explicit lessons taught to teens as young as 13. Of the nine commonly used curricula studied in the HHS report, most showed no impact in preventing teen sex, and one failed to even evaluate program effectiveness. All the programs reviewed by the HHS devoted an overwhelming amount of teaching time to topics such as condom usage, condom demonstration and sexual game play as methods of “safe” sex.

“Although they receive ten times the amount of government money as abstinence programs, so-called ‘comprehensive sex education’ has not been proven to delay teen sex,” states Valerie Huber, Executive Director of National Abstinence Education Abstinence (NAEA). “The predominant message encourages sexual activity. The message of abstinence is virtually non-existent.”

The HHS study also revealed some startling components of the “comprehensive” sex education programs for teens as young as 13 include lessons include:

• Advocating showering together as a no risk activity.
• Promoting methods for sexual stimulation.
• Conducting sexual role-play on how to help a partner maintain an erection.
• Describing how to eroticize condom use with a partner.
• Suggesting teens wear shades or a disguises when shopping for condoms so adults and parents won’t recognize them.

Parents communicated their strong support for abstinence education, as currently funded by Congress, in a recent 2007 Zogby poll. In fact, regardless of ideological leaning, parents from across America supported abstinence education over ‘comprehensive’ sex education by a 2:1 margin. The very topics that parents wanted curricula to cover are absent in most ‘comprehensive’ sex education.”

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By Peter Robbio, June 13, 2007; National Abstinence Education Association
Contact: Patra Stephan, 202 248-5420
PO Box 15198
West Palm Beach, FL
33416-5198