Spring Break
Students battle the state of national sexual education
On sex education, students find differing views between states, individual teachers
Tara Pistorese
Issue date: 4/2/08 Section: News
Is current sex education effective?
Three OSU students recently conducted an extensive project to determine just that - the effectiveness of sex education in school systems nationwide - for their women studies course with instructor Michelle Marie.
The original assignment was for each group of students to create its own activism project.
"[The] activism project was designed to combat the issue of abstinence-only sexual education in public schools," said Karla Macy, a senior in human development and family sciences, in her final essay.
"To fight this problem, my group formed a plan to gather a diverse sample of data and information regarding sexual education in public schools."
Karla Macy, Shireen Noroozi and Morgan Golding went door to door in the Corvallis School District, asking questions about sex education offered in local schools.
"Shireen and Morgan visited Corvallis High School and spoke with the counseling offices to find out what is being taught in their health classes regarding sexual education," Macy said.
The group extended their research beyond the local spectrum.
"Another one of us interviewed Kathy Greaves, who teaches human sexuality here, to see what incoming college freshmen know about human sexuality. We also wrote letters to certain people in Congress," said Noroozi, a freshman majoring in English.
In the letter Macy, Noroozi and Golding sent to Congress, they argued that an abstinence-only curriculum is unfair to teenagers, as such programs "assume that after the course takes place, teens will choose not to have sex."
The letter also expresses concern that the United States is not "receiving the information [it needs] to make healthy and safe decisions regarding sexuality and sexual activity."
The students have yet to receive a response from Congress. However, they were interested to see the results of their local research.
"We found that there was kind of a push-pull between what the state wanted and what the schools were actually teaching," Noroozi said.
According to research the group conducted for the project, the state and the district are currently pushing for elimination of abstinence-only sex education, due to its statistical ineffectiveness.
However, many health teachers are still refusing to provide information on alternative sexual protection methods such as condoms.
"They don't feel it is their responsibility, so there is still a little bit of conflict there," Noroozi said.
Overall, the students were pleased with the outcome of their project.
"It went really well," Macy said. "It was fun."
Tara Pistorese, police beat reporter
news@dailybarometer.com. 737-2231
Three OSU students recently conducted an extensive project to determine just that - the effectiveness of sex education in school systems nationwide - for their women studies course with instructor Michelle Marie.
The original assignment was for each group of students to create its own activism project.
"[The] activism project was designed to combat the issue of abstinence-only sexual education in public schools," said Karla Macy, a senior in human development and family sciences, in her final essay.
"To fight this problem, my group formed a plan to gather a diverse sample of data and information regarding sexual education in public schools."
Karla Macy, Shireen Noroozi and Morgan Golding went door to door in the Corvallis School District, asking questions about sex education offered in local schools.
"Shireen and Morgan visited Corvallis High School and spoke with the counseling offices to find out what is being taught in their health classes regarding sexual education," Macy said.
The group extended their research beyond the local spectrum.
"Another one of us interviewed Kathy Greaves, who teaches human sexuality here, to see what incoming college freshmen know about human sexuality. We also wrote letters to certain people in Congress," said Noroozi, a freshman majoring in English.
In the letter Macy, Noroozi and Golding sent to Congress, they argued that an abstinence-only curriculum is unfair to teenagers, as such programs "assume that after the course takes place, teens will choose not to have sex."
The letter also expresses concern that the United States is not "receiving the information [it needs] to make healthy and safe decisions regarding sexuality and sexual activity."
The students have yet to receive a response from Congress. However, they were interested to see the results of their local research.
"We found that there was kind of a push-pull between what the state wanted and what the schools were actually teaching," Noroozi said.
According to research the group conducted for the project, the state and the district are currently pushing for elimination of abstinence-only sex education, due to its statistical ineffectiveness.
However, many health teachers are still refusing to provide information on alternative sexual protection methods such as condoms.
"They don't feel it is their responsibility, so there is still a little bit of conflict there," Noroozi said.
Overall, the students were pleased with the outcome of their project.
"It went really well," Macy said. "It was fun."
Tara Pistorese, police beat reporter
news@dailybarometer.com. 737-2231
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