While school is out for the summer, state officials are working hard to complete a statewide plan to reduce the number of teen pregnancies and STDs.

Colorado has made good progress in protecting teens’ sexual health, thanks to a 2007 law requiring that sex education programs, when provided, must address the benefits of abstinence and give medically accurate, science-based, culturally relevant information that includes the use of contraception.

We’re moving in the right direction: The U.S. teen pregnancy rate is at a 40-year low, largely due to comprehensive sex education programs that include information about both abstinence and contraception.

But we still have the highest teen pregnancy rate of any developed country, and one in two sexually active youth contracts a common STD by age 25, says the Centers for Disease Control & Prevention.

In Colorado, “condom use has been inconsistent, sexual violence among youth is on the rise and … rates of chlamydia are increasing,” says the statewide plan, Youth Sexual Health in Colorado: A Call to Action, from the Colorado Department of Public Health and Environment (CDPHE).

The plan, to be finalized this summer and formally launched in October, stresses the need for comprehensive education in alignment with state law.

Yet, abstinence-only programs are still prevalent in Colorado, after the Denver School Board’s 2010 end-run around former Gov. Bill Ritter to apply for $3.2 million in federal funding for abstinence-only programs. As a result, Colorado has many abstinence-only programs using fear and shame-based tactics to “promote an ultra-conservative ideology,” said a 2010 review by the Sexuality Information and Education Council of the United States and the Healthy Colorado Youth Alliance. Confusing matters further, providers are constantly re-framing their messages to appear consistent with state statutes.

Colorado’s law regarding comprehensive education also lacks consequences for school districts that don’t comply, said state Sen. Angela Giron, D-Pueblo, in a recent panel discussion on youth sexual health. “There’s no accountability,” she said.

Abstinence-only providers in Colorado include the Center for Relationship Education (CRE), which promotes WAIT Training, as well as Friends First, Life Network and Pueblo Youth Project.

Both comprehensive and abstinence-only programs teach abstinence as the only choice that is 100 percent effective in preventing teen pregnancy and STDs. The difference is, comprehensive programs also include information about contraception.

A study by the National Campaign to Prevent Teen Pregnancy found that comprehensive education changes teen behaviors: 40 percent of comprehensive programs delayed initiation of sex, while more than 60 percent reduced unprotected sex.

In contrast, there was no strong evidence to show that any abstinence program was effective. Students in abstinence-only programs are also less likely to protect themselves against STDs — or to seek help when infected, studies show.

In Colorado, 88 percent of parents believe schools should teach comprehensive sexual health education, said a CDPHE survey.

Last school year, the Boulder Valley School District suspended Brad Seng of the Real Choices Pregnancy Care Center from speaking events after a middle-school parent complained about his abstinence presentation.

The parent was concerned that Seng sent girls the wrong message that sexual activity is dirty. Students spit chewed-up food into water glasses and were asked to drink the “contaminated” water — prompting students to comment on how “nasty” it looked.

Abstinence-only curricula also promote sexist gender stereotypes. Choosing the Best, offered by Life Network, includes a story describing a man as a knight in shining armor, who loses confidence when the maiden he tries to rescue offers suggestions on how to slay the dragon. The moral: Too many suggestions may make the knight reject the princess.

A CRE video featuring WAIT instructor Shelly Donahue shares more biases: “Girls are being assertive; these girls are emasculating these boys, and these boys are taking it,” she states. “But in their heart of hearts, these boys wish these girls would wait.”

Sexism and stereotypes are inappropriate in education: Both boys and girls need to learn lifelong responsibility for their sexual health and choices.

Friends First and CRE also target “high-risk” populations resulting from the “broken nature” of single-parent homes, presenting marriage as the only morally correct family structure and giving harmful messages to children of never-married, divorced, or LGBT parents who can’t legally marry in Colorado, said the education council’s review.

“This is all about the incredible social needs that result when families are fractured,” said CRE founder Joneen MacKenzie in another video. “We are trying from the grassroots level to really create a social change.”

But ideological efforts to create social change have no place in our kids’ classrooms. In addition, a short-term focus on avoiding sex until marriage denies teens the information they need to make lifelong decisions about their sexual health.

Some 60 percent of Colorado’s high school seniors are having sex, a fact we can’t ignore. “It’s not enough to help some students delay sexual activity while leaving other students unprepared or ill-equipped to protect themselves,” said Lisa Olcese, executive director of the Healthy Colorado Youth Alliance.

The fundamental tenet of our education system is to teach lifelong knowledge. Many teens need health information on contraception now — but all our youth will need this information at some point in their lives.

By trying to scare and shame kids and withholding critical health information, abstinence-only programs treat teens like toddlers. “WAIT Training uses a directive teaching style (lead a child to the healthiest choice) rather than a non-directive teaching style (give the child all the choices and expect them to make a choice that is right for them),” according to CRE’s website.

If we expect teens to make responsible health choices, we must empower and support them with evidence-based and culturally sensitive information to make responsible decisions. That means every parent at every K-through-12 back-to-school night across Colorado this fall needs to ask critical questions about what, if any, sexual health information will be provided to students, whether it’s compliant with state law, and how parents will be notified.

Comprehensive, evidence-based sex education works. So why veer from the facts? Teen sex has serious emotional and physical consequences. There’s no need to add fairy tales to that story.

Lisa Wirthman

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