Standardizing Comprehensive Sex Education in United States

Sex education is a process of getting information and conceptualizing the facts about sex, sexual identity, intimacy and relationships. Since young people have the right to sex education, it is therefore important that they get this education so that they can be able to make informed and competent choices. In doing so they are able to protect themselves from sexually related problems like abuse, exploitation and sexually transmitted diseases such as HIV/AIDS.

All parties associated with young people like teachers, parents and even the government should come together so as to ensure the young people are educated on those issues concerning sex and the repercussions especially, if they get involved with it when still young. Schools being the ideal place for these young people to learn about sex education, teachers or educators should be their main source of information about sex education. Therefore sex education curriculum should be well implemented and the teachers should be well trained on how to strategically implement this education.

Since there is no standardized comprehensive sex education in United States, this issue has resulted into high rate of STDs and teen sexuality. To curb this, it is important that a standardized comprehensive sex education to be implemented across all the cities in the United States. Most cities emphasize on abstinence which is has proven to be ineffective without proper sex education. So it is important that proper sex education be given to these young people so as to be in a safer side when dealing with their sexual problems.

The government should introduce programs in schools which emphasizes not only on abstinence but also other measure like effective use of contraceptives and condoms. This will reduce the chances of sexually transmitted diseases like HIV and AIDs and unwanted pregnancies which may lead to school dropouts. Take for example the Dutch Government health organization, adopted the idea of “long, live, love" in their school curriculum which has been in place for about 12-15 years now. This program has led to the Netherland to have the lowest rate of teen pregnancy in the world (8.1 per 1000 young women aged 15 to 19 year) since they emphasize on adolescence sexuality, STI and the existence of AIDS and unwanted pregnancies. The curriculum also encourages a responsible attitude and positive outlook on these issues.  Its main objective is to develop skills, particularly in communication and negotiation that will enable students to transfer their generally positive intentions with regard to safe sex in practice. The skill-directed activities are structured on video, which has been shown to require less effort of teachers than role-play.

Parents and the community at large should be involved in giving quality sex education to the young people. It is the duty of the older population to give a good guidance to the younger generation, since most young generation will always be easily influenced with the happenings in their surroundings. If the community or parents have a general convention that sexual matters should be openly discussed between the members of the society, then the younger generations will get involved in such discussions and therefore gain the confidence of discussing issues affecting them in their social lives and their relationships. This will make the young generations to be able to make better decision when dealing with matters associated with sex.

To pass any information effectively from one party to another, there should be means through which such information should be conveyed. Since young people get information about sex education from different sources like teachers, parents, peers and even internet, it is important that this be well coordinated to avoid these young people getting confused. This calls for integration of information about sexuality so that whatever these young generations get from internet, teachers or parents should be of the same content.

Parents should develop a strategy with which they will be able to communicate with their children about sex and the consequences of having unsafe sex rather than insisting on abstinence alone. Most children are not open to their parents when it comes to the topics concerning sex. In encouraging them in doing so, parent-child relationship should be well developed. Parents should therefore discuss and encourage their children to feel free discuss about their sex and relationships matters. This will develop a good relationship with the parents and the children will be able to learn more about the consequences of practicing unsafe sex and make informed decisions while dealing with such activities.

In conclusion, sex education is very important in schools since this is the pillar to any student who is passing through the stage of adolescent. This is because the majority of students have got no idea on what it means to get involved in early sex and the consequences behind it. That is why the majority of young people have been reported to drop out of schools due to unwanted pregnancies, sexual transmitted diseases and even early marriages.

However, not only the teachers who should be involved in educating the young people on matters concerning sex but parents should also be part and parcel of that education. They shouldn’t shy away from discussing on the topics rather they should develop a good parent-child relationship which should create an open environment when discussing on matters concerning sex. There is also need for young people to be educated on negative peer pressure influences and how to abstain from them. Finally, there is need for all institutions to come up with sex education programs through school curriculum activities.