North Carolina’s new school health standards don’t go far enough for some conservative groups in promoting the teaching of abstinence until marriage.
The State Board of Education voted 7-1 on Thursday to adopt new healthful living standards for K-12 public schools that include multiple references to teaching about the benefits of abstinence.
But conservative critics say the message is also mixed, with wording that could encourage students to have sex.
“The State Board of Education has failed North Carolina’s children by adopting standards for teaching sex education in all of our public schools that promote the teaching of ‘safer sex’ techniques while minimizing the risk of pregnancy and STDs, and that fail to teach abstinence from sexual activity as an expected standard of behavior for all school-aged children, as our sex education law requires,” Tami Fitzgerald, executive director of the N.C. Values Coalition, said in a statement Thursday.
State Superintendent Catherine Truitt has defended the legality of the standards, saying that multiple legal professionals within the state Department of Public Instruction have reviewed them for compliance.
“That doesn’t mean everyone is going to be satisfied with it, but it is compliant,” Truitt said of the new health standards at an April state board meeting.
Abstinence in the new health standards
State law requires reproductive health and safety classes in public schools to “teach that abstinence from sexual activity outside of marriage is the expected standard for all school‑age children.”
The new health standards went through three drafts before being approved Thursday.
References to abstinence in the new health standards include:
▪ In seventh grade, teachers will explain the physical, social and emotional benefits of choosing to abstain from sexual activity until marriage.
▪ Another objective in seventh grade is to “recognize abstinence is the only certain means of avoiding pregnancy, sexually transmitted infections and other associated health and emotional problems.”
▪ In eighth grade, one of the objectives is to “explore family, school, and community resources for the prevention of sexual risks through abstinence, postponed sexual activity, and safer sex practices.”
▪ In ninth grade, one of the standards is to evaluate abstinence from sexual intercourse until marriage as a positive choice for young people. Within this standard is the objective of evaluating skills and strategies to utilize safer sex options, including abstinence until marriage, postponing participation in sexual activity and contraceptive use.
DPI staff says the new standards comply with state requirements on promoting abstinence.
Abstinence Until Marriage in NC health standards by Keung Hui on Scribd
Critics: Standards ‘undermine’ abstinence
But the N.C. Values Coalition charges that the health standards fall short of stressing abstinence.
“These standards send a confusing message to children about sex and will escalate sexual activity, pregnancy and STD rates and will give the Planned Parenthood types a front row seat in teaching our children about sexuality,” Fitzgerald said.
The complaints were echoed by the John Locke Foundation, which charged that the standards “make little, if any, progress towards upholding premarital abstinence as the expectation for student conduct.”
“Furthermore, the standards continue to undermine themselves by discussing premarital abstinence in the same breath as contraceptive use and ‘safer sex options,’” according to a post by Kaitlyn Shepherd, policy analyst for the Locke Foundation’s Center for Effective Education. “As a result, references to premarital abstinence come across as empty platitudes that merely pay lip service to the legislative intent expressed in statute.”
On Thursday, state board member Olivia Oxendine was the only person to vote against the standards. Oxendine said she didn’t feel the legislative requirements around abstinence were included “to the extent that I think they should have been.”
Two conservative board members who often side with her — Lt. Gov. Mark Robinson and State Treasurer Dale Folwell — weren’t at the meeting. State board member Donna Tipton-Rogers also wasn’t present.
