2:34
- wellness
- June 15, 2021
Inside movement to make sex education inclusive
Fewer than 8% of LGBTQ+ students have received inclusive sex ed in school.
2:34
\"In the past, what wasn’t prioritized was making sure that things were inclusive for our LGBTQ+ students in all of this because all we talked about was preventing pregnancy and STIs,\" she said. \"It’s important to understand that LGBTQ+ students can also get pregnant and get STIs and they also have a right to this information like every other student in the classroom.\"
\"That is what I’m working towards when I say inclusive sex education. I want it to be affirming. We want our educators to be able to provide a space where all of our students feel seen and reflected,\" McBride said. \"They’re getting the information they actually need versus what is being served as the status quo.\"
The key to an inclusive curriculum, according to McBride, is making the topics of gender and sexuality differences more than just a single lesson.
\"It’s not just, ‘Okay, today is going to be the day when we have LGBTQ+ class,'\" she said. \"These are essential skills that need to be integrated in everything that we’re doing.\"
\"Instead of saying boyfriend and girlfriend, say partner. Remove gender binary pronouns from the curriculum when you’re using examples. Look to include examples of families of all types throughout the entire curriculum,\" McBride continued. \"It’s about integrating these changes into every single delivery of every class as opposed to having a one-day. This is the day to check off this box.\"
Across the country, 39 states and the District of Columbia mandate sex education and/or HIV education. Nearly 30 states require that abstinence be stressed in sex education classes, and 19 states require instruction on the importance of engaging in sexual activity only within marriage to be provided, according to the Guttmacher Institute.
The type of sex education that is funded federally can swing with each presidential administration from abstinence-focused, or sexual risk avoidance, -- teaching students only to avoid sex to avoid unwanted pregnancy and sexually transmitted infections (STIs) -- to comprehensive sex education that includes evidence-based information about contraception as well as abstinence.
![\"PHOTO:](\"http://a.abcnews.com/images/GMA/rainbow-condom-rf-gty-ps-210615_1623790662845_hpMain_4x3t_384.jpg\")
Advocates of inclusive sex education are pushing for Congress to pass the Real Education and Access for Healthy Youth Act (REAHYA), which was introduced in May and would require the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) to award grants for comprehensive sex education. The bill also mandates instruction that is \"Inclusive of young people with varying gender identities, gender expressions, and sexual orientations,\" according to Sen. Cory Booker (D-NJ).
Advocates point to data they say shows that accurate and inclusive sex education is important for students' mental and physical health.
Youth ages 15 to 24 account for almost half of new sexually transmitted infections in the United States, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC). The teen pregnancy rate in the U.S. has been continually falling, but remains \"substantially higher than in other western industrialized nations,\" according to the CDC.
When it comes to mental health, LGBTQ+ youth seriously contemplate suicide at almost three times the rate of heterosexual youth and are almost five times as likely to have attempted suicide compared to heterosexual youth, according to the Trevor Project, a national organization that provides crisis intervention services to LGBTQ+ youth.
\"I see people in my DMs who are like, ‘[My school] didn't teach us anything,\" said Dr. Jennifer Lincoln, an Oregon-based OBGYN who has gone viral for answering sex education questions on social media. \"That’s unfortunate that they feel they have to go online and not [learn it] in a curriculum.\"
\"When kids are not getting information or not feeling welcomed at school, they have way worse outcomes,\" she said.
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