School Boards, These Days. . .

After realizing that 13 percent of its female students were pregnant last year, an Ohio school board decides to reconsider using their out-dated (developed circa 1987!), abstinence-only sex "education" program. Apparently, the school was not fulfilling their duty by teaching that "bearing children out-of-wedlock is likely to have harmful consequences for the child, the child's parents, and society" or emphasizing the "importance of attaining self-sufficiency before engaging in sexual activity" (points #6 and 8, respectively, out of the 8-Point Definition of Abstinence-Only Education defined by the federal government). From the local NBC affiliate:

An Ohio school board is expanding sex education following the revelation that 13 percent of one high school's female students were pregnant last year.

There were 490 female students at Timken High School in 2005, and 65 were pregnant, WEWS-TV in Cleveland reported.

The new Canton school board program promotes abstinence but also will teach students who decide to have sex how to do so responsibly, bringing the city school district's health curriculum in line with national standards.

According to the Canton Health Department, statistics through July 2005 showed that 104 of the 586 babies born to Canton residents in Aultman Hospital and Mercy Medical Center had mothers between the ages of 11 and 19.

Thus far, research proving that these programs aren't effective at preventing unintended teen pregnancy hasn't been enough for the federal and state governments to stop pouring millions of tax dollars into abstinence-only-until-marriage programs. As the national standard, abstinence-only-until-marriage programs have been implemented in schools across the country, the federal government spending over $1 billion to do so since 1996.

Pennsylvania received $6,731,542 in federal funds for abstinence-only-until-marriage programs in the fiscal year 2005. I wonder how many pregnant teens we have in our schools???


For more information on this issue, visit Advocates for Youth and the ACLU's section on abstinence-only programs.

Julie in Philly