Sex education has always had the ability to raise a ruckus among adults and teens alike. It’s a touchy subject to be sure, but should there be an actual sex education class taught in the high schools?

The West Virginia State Board of Education mandates that students have some sex education about preventing HIV/AIDS in health classes, or related subjects. Teachers are required to talk about HIV/AIDS, STDs, and pregnancy prevention in their classes without limitations on what they can or cannot teach. (www.nasbe.org)

According to the website www.siecus.org, sex education programs in the schools complement the sex education the students receive at their homes. The classes merely are aimed to help students build strong foundations as they develop into adults and make wise decisions based on sex and their own sexuality.

In the United States the average age of becoming sexually active is 16. Approximately 66% of high school students have had sexual intercourse before they had graduated. (http://www.ppacca.org/site/pp.asp?c=kuJYJeO4F&b=139496) In 2000, 6.3 million women (there were 62 million in the world) between the ages of 15-44 became pregnant. Fortunately, 64% of the pregnancies were carried through, while a startling 21% were ended by abortion. The remaining 15% were miscarriages. (www.guttmacher.org)

The sexual image often portrayed is one of passion and intimacy with very little or nothing bad happening at all. This is rarely the case. Nationally, there are about 2800 girls under the age of twenty who get pregnant each DAY. 1 in every 4 teens will get some sort of STDs every year.

With the numbers of students getting pregnant before the age of twenty, and with approximately 4,000,000 teens getting STDs each year, it seems that perhaps the way sex education is being taught might not be reaching enough. Either that or students just aren’t listening.