Should Sex Education Be Taught in Schools?

Olivia Wang

Mr. Pevlin

English 9H

June 10th, 2015

Final draft

Should Sex Education Be Taught In Schools?

Youths and teenagers are often being marked as “rebellious” and “audacious”. One of the characteristics of “rebellious” and “audacious” teenagers is that they think they are able to try any new thing at their age, including sex. Without the correct knowledge of sex, these actions can end up in teenage mother or having sexually transmitted diseases, which are detrimental to rest of their lives. In fact, in United States, about one out of four teenage girls will become pregnant before age 20. (ncsl.org). Isn’t this very shocking? Therefore, comprehensive sex education should be taught in schools, so the students can raise their awareness about sex and their bodies’ safety, have a clearer understanding of the world around them, and be independent and mature to adapt into grown up society..

First, sex education in school raises students’ awareness about sex and their bodies’ safety. Sex education’s teachers or experts will inform students the right values of sex. For example, after students learned that unprotected sexual intercourse is dangerous and it may cause unexpected pregnancy and STD or HIV from class, the students will try to avoid sex without protection and with many partners to forestall the diseases and troubles. Sex education should also introduce the rational views on sex, it is not guilty and it is a form to express love. The students should know as long as they pay responsibility for their sexual actions and it is done at a proper occasion with proper protection and contraceptives, and it is not harmful and is required by body’s needs when they grow up. Some people may argue that sex education may trigger students’ desires to initiate a sexual relationship, but in fact research has identified highly effective sex education and HIV prevention programs affect multiple behaviors and/or 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, and the incidence of unprotected sex, and/or increasing the use of condoms and contraception among sexually active participants. Long-term impacts have included lower STI and/or pregnancy rates. (Advocatesforyouth.org). Most of the teenagers will have sex eventually, it is not inevitable, therefore sex education is a more effective way to prevent students from making irreparable mistakes at young age. Students will care more about their safety and therefore they will conduct healthy, protected sexual actions in the future after the education.

Second, comprehensive sex education can let students understand more about the nature. All or most of the multicellular and complicated organisms reproduce through sex, and even the lives of students themselves are created through the sex between their parents! Understanding the principal of sex also aids students to master science. For example, to acquire the theory of evolution, the students need to know that sexual intercourses happen between different organisms and those actions create more advanced and heterogeneous life forms. To learn about genes, DNAs, chromosomes, fertilization, body parts, etc., students have to engage with some ideas of sex. If students are ignorant about the concepts of sex, then they will misunderstand many laws of science and the nature of earth. Therefore, sex education is needed in school to teach students about the results that sex brings to society. This course may have offended religious families or groups, but nowadays the public emphasizes the facts and science, so to study science, students have to grasp the knowledge of sex and this knowledge is also a part of scientific studies.