by Michael Foust, posted Friday, January 13, 2012 (12 years ago)
WASHINGTON (BP) -- Four leading education organizations have released national sex-ed standards that encourage fifth-graders to be taught about sexual orientation and eighth-graders to learn about gender identity and the morning-after pill, but many say the recommendations infringe on parental rights.
The non-binding standards by the National Education Association and three other groups are billed as the "first-ever national standards" for sex-ed in schools, and they provide detailed suggestions for what students should learn by the second, fifth, eighth and 12th grades. From a social conservative's standpoint, nearly every page of the recommendations has something controversial.
Eighth graders should be able to 'differentiate between gender identity, gender expression and sexual orientation.'-- New sex-ed standards
By the second grade, students are to learn the "proper names for body parts, including male and female anatomy." By the fifth grade, they should learn that sexual orientation is the "romantic attraction of an individual to someone of the same gender or a different gender." By the end of the eighth grade, students should be able to "differentiate between gender identity, gender expression and sexual orientation" and learn about the morning-after pill, which can cause abortions. They also should know how to use a condom, the standards say. Gender identity is a term that refers to men and women who, in essence, believe they were born the wrong sex. Both gender identity and gender expression encompass cross-dressers and transgendereds.
Although the recommendations are non-binding, the NEA and the other groups hope they catch on with schools. Others, though, are hoping schools simply ignore them.
"In a society where adults are sharply divided on how to address these issues, it makes no sense whatsoever for groups like the NEA to tell our children how they should think," said Bob Stith, the Southern Baptist national strategist for gender issues and representative of the convention's Task Force on Ministry to Homosexuals.
Stith added in his comments to Baptist Press, "The reality is that it has the potential to create serious conflicts between parents and children. If children are taught values that are in direct opposition to the biblical values of their parents, those parents would be put in an adversarial position with their own children. This is just simply not a healthy approach."
Among other recommendations, the standards say by the fifth grade, children should be able to:
-- "Identify medically accurate information about female and male reproductive anatomy.
-- "Define HIV and identify some age appropriate methods of transmission, as well as ways to prevent transmission.
-- "Define sexual harassment and sexual abuse."
By the eighth grade, the standards say students should be able to:
-- "Analyze external influences that have an impact on one's attitudes about gender, sexual orientation and gender identity.
-- "Access accurate information about gender identity, gender expression and sexual orientation.
-- "Communicate respectfully with and about people of all gender identities, gender expressions and sexual orientations.
-- "Describe the steps to using a condom correctly."
The standards say that by the 12th grade, students should be able to: Read More
