Parents, groups object to new curriculum

New Brunswick sex-ed courses on hold after complaints

Eighteen-year-old Cathy Cotton wishes she knew then what she knows now.

She was 16, in Grade 11 at Moncton High School, when she became pregnant. Her boyfriend was 21. She says they used a condom, but it failed.
She was one of about 40 girls in her public school district to become pregnant that year. Ms. Cotton insists that if her school's sex-education program had been better, she would have been better informed.
“We had a Grade 9 sex-ed teacher who was very fond of saying that condoms are 100-per-cent effective. Well, I am proof they are not,” said Ms. Cotton, who went on to graduate and now attends Mount Allison University, juggling her studies with caring for 15-month-old Leah.

To move with the times, the New Brunswick Department of Education decided to beef up its sex-education curriculum for pupils in Grades 6 to 8, starting next fall. The new course work would go beyond the basics, to include topics such as homosexuality, masturbation, oral sex and orgasm.
But such hot-button topics drew a firestorm of protests from some parents and groups such as the Christian Action Federation and Right To Life, who say the curriculum is too sexually explicit and does not emphasize abstinence. The new program is now being reassessed.
The curriculum, already approved by the department's advisory committee, has been tested in a handful of schools for two years with little opposition. But recently, as its full-scale implementation drew near, the small but passionate opposition surfaced, holding public meetings across the province and meeting with the Education Minister and politicians.
As a result, Education Minister Madeline Dubé decided to reassess the curriculum before giving it final approval. Ms. Dubé, a former social worker who has said that parents could pull their children from the class if they wish, is expected to make her decision soon.
“She wanted to make sure that going ahead with it was the appropriate thing,” said her spokesman, Jason Humphrey. “She was already comfortable with what had been approved by the committee. She is just being careful in her considerations.”

The curriculum, worth about 12 hours of health-class time, was created in response to an extensive survey that found New Brunswick parents, teachers and students felt strongly that the sex education being offered was not apace with young people's changing attitudes and behaviour. Teenage pregnancy rates across Canada have fallen over the past few decades, but sexually transmitted diseases among teens are on the rise and younger children are experimenting with sex.
“The sex-ed curriculum my kids experienced was extremely lacking and that's the view held by the vast majority of parents,” said Glyn Morgan, president of the New Brunswick Federation of Home and School Association, which speaks for thousands of parents.
“Kids are starving for new, accurate information,” Ms. Morgan said.
But Bev Hilder of Fredericton, who has a nine-year-old son who would soon be student in the classes, doesn't see it that way. She believes the new program would push children toward experimenting with sex.
“There's anal sex and masturbation and menstruation and contraception,” Ms. Hilder said of the proposed syllabus. “This curriculum would not be called comprehensive. It should be called contraception. You have to look pretty hard to see abstinence mentioned.
“Abstaining from anal or vaginal intercourse, but not oral sex, is not abstinence,” she said. “They're giving out facts, but they're pushing sex.”

Sex education is the norm in Canadian schools, with each province putting in place curriculum based on broad guidelines issued by Health Canada. The programs vary widely, and it is difficult to gauge whether New Brunswick lags behind other provinces. But controversies are generally few.
“The extent and quality of sex-health education varies from province to province, board to board, and even classroom to classroom,” said Alex MacKay, research co-ordinator with the Toronto-based Sex Information and Education Council of Canada. “Debate has been generally calm in the last couple of years. With respect to parents, every survey that's ever been done has found support for comprehensive sex education. And any modification that increases the scope of sex education is a significant, positive step.”
Anne Marie Dingee, a guidance counsellor and teacher at Quispamsis Middle School, near Saint John, has taught the new curriculum for the past two years in a pilot project. She said she ran into little opposition, with just one child taken out of class for a single day.
Grade 6 students, aged 10 and 11, learn about puberty and the proper names of body parts. Seventh graders learn about prenatal development. The next year they learn about sexually transmitted infections.

“Most parents support the curriculum because they know kids are talking about sex anyway,” Ms. Dingee said. “Children are hitting puberty earlier, so we want to teach it earlier. Kids are not naive.”
But Carolyn Barry, a family physician in Fredericton who has been one of the new curriculum's most vocal opponents, see it as a “how to” guide that pushes youngsters toward sex. She said she is not “against” sex education.
“We all want what's best for the children,” Dr. Barry said. “But what I'm talking about is not what they [Education Department] are talking about. I mean, anal sex is pushed in this curriculum and it's the unhealthiest sex.
“Young people do need to know about reproduction and STDs and contraception and its failure rate. But this is not the way to present it. I don't see any choice for the minister but throwing this out and starting again.”
Ms. Hilder, who says she will consider home schooling her son if the curriculum goes ahead, said the planned program would give students a mixed message on abstinence.

The curriculum for Grade 7 students includes a section on abstinence called “It is OK to say no.” It is followed by a section called “How do I know when?” In Grade 8, students are taught that “abstinence is 100-per-cent effective in the prevention of sexually transmitted infections and pregnancy” and given 11 reasons why teens should delay having sexual intercourse. It also notes that “some adolescents do not wish to abstain from sex.”
Sandra Byers, chairwoman of the department of psychology at the University of New Brunswick, who helped do the original survey that sparked the proposed changes, said teachers must be trusted to deliver sexual-health information with sensitivity.
“Saying the information shouldn't be made available is like saying the teachers shouldn't have a dictionary because there are words in there that are too hard for certain ages,” Dr. Byers said.
“The criticism of sex education in the past is that it teaches the plumbing and that's it. But that information doesn't change behaviour and neither does fear. We tried that with drugs and it didn't work.”

Shawna Richer
2 April 2005

http://www.theglobeandmail.com/servlet/ArticleNews/TPStory/LAC/20050402/SEXED02/TPEducation/

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