>I was EXTREMELY disappointed to learn that North Carolina ONLY teaches abstinence in sex education. I had already covered all of the information at home so my daughter was surprised in class when she discovered they weren't going to cover alternative methods of birth contol. I originally thought they would. She brought it up in the class and the teacher responded that not only would it not be covered, it would not be discussed. It was forbidden by the school district, the PTA, and the state. Surprise surprise. What surprised me MOST is that most of the PTA's in North Carolina actually supported that stupidity. The general idea is that since alternative methods of contraceptive are often based on religious principles, it is up to each family to discuss what they feel is appropriate for their family AT HOME. The program is a good one overall (covers all the health issues, diet, exercise, basic anatomy, et al) except for that one MAJOR lacking point. I understood that it was the
> decision of North Carolina and it is different in each state. When I was in the 8th grade and living in Colorado, sex education was mandatory and it covered EVERYTHING.

Well, maybe it's not so bad. Once they get the needed number of enforcers that can visit people at home and make sure that the parents aren't shirking their duties in teaching the rest of it, it should be a pretty good program overall.

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>>>The bush government spend each year about 87 million dollar for education of sexual abstinence.
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>>>I'm not challenging any of this, but I do wonder if the 87 million was exclusively in teaching abstinence, or covered other topics as well.
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>>The story did not tell that, and frankly I don't think the investigators do know exactly either.
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>>>There are two general parts to sex education - the physical aspect/consequences and the emotional consequences. The former may seem easy to teach (just take teenagers on a field trip to a public health clinic), but the latter is much tougher.
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>>>So even if teenagers are smart enough to take all the major precautions (condoms, etc.) to prevent the physical consequences....there are damn few teenagers who can handle the emotional aspects of sex.
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>>Hmmmm, I don't know exactly what you mean by that. Of course there are emotional factors involved, but to be honest I did not hear of many teenagers who had major emotional problems after having sex, other than being abused, raped or having sex against their will. I think it is difficult for me to have a good sense for what the problems are as holland is very liberal on this topic. Even when I was a teenager there was A LOT of sexual education on school and the regular media. Some 10 years ago there even was a TV series called 'How to fu*k'. There are also some governmental institutes (Rutget stichting) that are aiming for education and helping esspecially young people with problems on all terrains of sexuality including topics like sexualdeceases, abortion and teenage pregnancies, homosexual feelings, etc. Many parents just give their teenagers condoms when they go out, just to prevent teenage pregnancies, and Sexual deceases. Appearantly it is working as holland has one of the
>lowest
>> teenage pregancy and teenage birth rates of the world.
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>>>The best parents/adult role models in the world are ones successful at raising their teens to realize that they don't have all the answers.
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>>That is sure one important aspect of it. The other aspect is that parent should not forbid what they can't possibly prevent. I've never been forbidden, to smoke, to drink, to use drugs, to anything else, but I was educated and raised in such way that I never had the urge to smoke or use drugs (I could not resisit my beer though).
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>>Walter,