Persuasive Essay On Sexual Education

While sexual education is mandatory in almost all secondary schools across Australia, the level of depth at which it is taught varies throughout every school. Many highly important areas of sex ed, such as learning about consent, contraceptive options and violence in relationships, are less commonly taught in high school, with puberty typically being the prime topic taught in PDHPE lessons instead. But when we look at the increase in things such as sexual assault, sexual violence, Sexually Transmitted Infections and teenage pregnancy among today’s youth, we must wonder why such imperative subjects to educate teenagers on are discussed so minimally.

Sexual education is a highly debatable topic, but many believe the information taught to students should be abstinence-only. Abstinence-only education has been put in place in order to educate students about the social, mental, and physical benefits of resisting from all sexual activity. It emphasizes the unsafe impacts of participating in sexual activity before marriage and having casual sex. It also promotes the idea that sexual abstinence is the only way to prevent pregnancy and sexually transmitted disease. Abstinence education only permits the discussion of contraception and condoms in terms of failure in order to utterly discourage casual sex (Wilgoren, 1). Along with teaching the physical dangers of sex, abstinence education also teaches the mental dangers of sex (Abstinence-Only Education, 1). Sex has many risks and dangers that are not

I think it is safe to say that no two words elicit more feelings of concern, anxiety, and anger in parents, and stirs up more controversy and debate than the words “sexual education”. This especially true with the implementation of the new, revised sexual education curriculum in Ontario schools. Consequently, this controversy has strongly divided individuals, families, and organizations between those who approved of and those who opposed and protested against school-based programs that providee sexual health education to children. But why so much opposition? This is due to the significant changes made to the sexual education curriculum and the sensitive nature of the topics being taught to children regarding sexuality as a whole, changes which are seen as both radical and “even more explicit and more age-inappropriate than before…” (“Ontario’s Radical,” n.d.).

Sex education for American youth has been a topic of discussion across the nation since the early 1980s. Teen pregnancies and sexually transmitted disease are two major problems throughout the U.S.. Sexually transmitted infections have been an ongoing problem for American people since World War I. To combat the growing teen pregnancy and STI rates, the U.S. established organized sex education. Since sex education has been integrated in schools across the nation, it has been heavily influenced by religion. The federal government has funded abstinence-only education programs for over a quarter century. Abstinence-only

All over the globe young girls are becoming mothers without the proper understanding of what it may do with their bodies and future. There is no question that there’s a stereotype connected to teen moms, especially in the United States. Think back to junior high while taking your sexual education course. You may remember a brief lesson about the dangers of having sex such as hormonal changes throughout teen years, sexually transmitted diseases and even the risks of teen pregnancy. Yes, this is enough to scare many juveniles to avoid intercourse, but there is still a minority of teens that think outside of the box. With an education system that only impacts a small range of students

Sexual education teaches adolescents about the use of birth control, their bodies, STD’s, and pregnancy. Due to the awareness of sexual education, adolescents are more careful about sexual intercourse. The pregnancy rate has reached the lowest in modern era between 1990-2010. It declined to 51% pregnancies per 1000 females ages 14-19 to 57.4%. This is the lowest recorded since 1973. Sexual education was not offered in schools until 1983 and many people had close to no knowledge about the options. Even though teens today are aware of their options today, they do not take proper precautions.

Abstinence pledges are becoming increasingly popular in adolescence, with over “2.5 million adolescence have taken public ‘virginity’ pledges”. Social movements have a set standard for these pledges, in which they promise to abstain from sex until marriage. The results have been a resounding success. This article shows that "abstinence pledge" programs are dramatically effective in reducing sexual activity among teenagers in grades 7 through 12. Based on a large national sample of adolescents, the study concludes that "adolescents who reported having taken a pledge to remain a virgin were at significantly lower risk of early age of sexual debut." Pledging delays intercourse for a long time. In this sense, the pledge works.

Because comprehensive sexuality education classes would encourage adolescences to abstain from sex but also concentrate more on social relationships, sexuality and a broader discussion of safe sex. Whereas, abstinence only programs prohibit or limit contraception information, therefore, aiding in the ineffectiveness of reducing the issues correlating to unsafe sex. Adolescence who receive accurate information about sexuality, including information about how to protect themselves from unwanted pregnancies and STD’s, are more likely to delay having

Reports display that abstinence-only curriculums do not decrease sexual intercourse by adolescent students. The United States Division of Health and Human Services publicized a report of abstinence curriculums. The authors revealed that conclusions from the study provided no indication that abstinence curriculums applied in elementary and middle schools are successful in decreasing the rate of adolescent or teenagers having sexual relations. Actually, teenagers did not benefit from all of the work and the millions of dollars that have been used into these curriculums. An additional study by Peter Bearman of Columbia University shows that over eighty-five percent of middle and high school students who vow to remain virgins until

The hypothesis is that abstinence-only sex education does not cause teenagers to have less sex when compared to comprehensive sex education. In a comprehensive sex course, the students would learn that abstinence is the best method for avoiding STIs and pregnancy, but it would also teach about positive contraceptive use, sexual health, and sexual expression. By teaching the

Each curriculum has a varying view on how sex education should be taught and when sex education should be taught to adolescents. Comprehensive sexuality education is the most effective type of sex education and followes the guidelines of starting sex education in kindergarten until twelfth grade. A broad range of topics are taught to students depending on their grade in order to help them develop vital skills and an understanding the varying topics. Abstinence-based sex education gives adolescence a broad range of knowledge on varying topics related to disease prevention and contraception with the emphasises that the best choice is to abstain from sex. Abstinence-only education promotes that abstaining from sex is the only way and does not address contraception or disease prevention. Abstinence-only-until-marriage sex education teaches adolescents that marriage is the only time sexual activities can take place and that in order to prevent disease and teen pregnancy refraining from sex until marriage is the only choice (SIECUS, 2001).

Comprehensive sex education is effective at assisting young people to make healthy decisions about sex and adopt healthy sexual behaviors. Strong evidence suggests that comprehensive approaches to sex education help young people both to withstand the pressures to have sex too soon and to have healthy, responsible and mutually protective relationships when they do become sexually active. A November 2007 report found that “two-thirds of the 48 comprehensive programs that supported both abstinence and the use of condoms and contraceptives for sexually active teens had positive behavioral effects (Rochman 2012).” Many delayed or reduced sexual activity, reduced the number of sexual partners, and increased the use of condoms or other contraceptives. Research has identified highly effective sex education and HIV prevention programs affect multiple behaviors and achieve positive health impacts. Behavioral outcomes have included delaying the initiation of sex as well as reducing the frequency of sex, the number of new partners, the incidence of unprotected sex, and increasing the use of condoms and contraception among sexually active participants. Long-term impacts have included lower STI and pregnancy rates (McKeon

Sex education has been an ongoing debate for decades. In the early 1970’s, twenty states voted restricting sex education from the school curriculum, leaving the District of Columbia and only three states (Maryland, Kentucky, New Jersey), requiring schools to teach sex education. By the mid 1980’s, a deadly disease permitted through sexual intercourse was recognized; the fear of catching a disease sex education quickly became accepted. In 1986, Surgeon General C. Everett Koop felt sex education should start as early as third grade stating, ‘“There is now no doubt … that we need sex education in schools and that it [should] include information on heterosexual and homosexual relationships. The lives of our young people depend on our

Sex education provides the youth with the skills and knowledge needed to practice safer sex behavior, refuse sex, and engage in positive youth development programs. The positive youth development programs provide the youth with motivation and confidence to gain and utilize the skills listed above. The federal government invests $1.5 billion dollars in abstinence-only programs, which have been proven ineffective among the adolescent population (Advocates for Youth, 2009). Nevertheless, there has been proposed budgets to create funding for programs that have been proven effective in reducing teen pregnancy, delaying sexual activity, or increasing contraceptive use (Advocates for Youth, 2009). limit the youth with information that is contradicted through the media everyday.

These types of programs use a holistic approach to provide young people with complete, accurate, and age-appropriate sex education that helps them reduce their risk of unintended pregnancy, and sexually transmitted infections and diseases. Comprehensive sex education programs are focused around providing medically accurate information on a board variety of topics related to sexuality including human development, relationships, decision making, abstinence, contraception, and disease prevention. These programs provide students with opportunities for developing skills as well as learning about all aspects of sex. Comprehensive sexual educational programs assist young adults with the tools to make informed decisions and build healthy relations. Also, they stress the value of abstinence without shaming sexual interactions and preparing young adults for when they do eventually become sexually active. Furthermore, these programs provide youth with accurate information about the health benefits and side effects of all contraceptives, including condoms, as a means to prevent unwanted pregnancies and reduce the risk of contracting sexually transmitted infections and diseases. These programs also encourage communication about sexuality between parent and child. In addition, comprehensive sexual education programs teach young adults the