When I was four, I read a book on human anatomy; being four, most of it went over my head. When I was seven, my third grade recess playmate whispered a “bad word” for penis that her older sister had told her. When I was ten, the kids in my class were separated by sex and herded into classrooms, where the girls learned about tampons and mood swings and the boys learned about erections and cracking voices. When I was thirteen, someone from the teen clinic came into my history class and taught us how to put on a condom. The purpose of this recitation isn’t to detail my encounters with sex education, but to comment on their infrequency.

Surely there were more playground encounters than one, the teen clinic presentation wasn’t the only group to offer their condom-application advice, and I most definitely read a human anatomy book more than once; despite these encounters, I didn’t learn what consent really was until tenth grade. I didn’t know that there was a word– harassment– for the cat calls I got on the street at age twelve. I was never told, in detail, how to find birth control, or how to talk about intimacy with a partner, or how to take care of a baby. There were other presentations in history class: one was about mental illness, another about not driving under the influence. I vaguely remember the “Secrets” assembly freshman year, in which two of the characters got a disease from sharing needles, and one got pregnant and didn’t know what to do about it. That’s what stands out to me from ninth grade, the only year in my school career in which I’ve obtained formal sex education.
Something’s got to change. With current access to social media and the internet increasing at an overwhelming rate, and the ages of internet-capable phone and computer users rapidly decreasing– a 2015 study found that 53% of American kids have a phone by age six– it is all too easy to find sexual content. I have no problem with sexual content, but it’s important that it be accompanied by some knowledge, some awareness of what exactly that piece of media is showing, and what it means. When the pictures, videos, and messages are absorbed into young brains with no forethought, things can turn sour.
Additionally, it seems that access to in-school sex ed is depended on the socioeconomic status of the area– at Brook Haven, the middle school I attended, there was no formal sex and drug ed; the only presentation I remember was one 50-minute talk on drug and alcohol abuse by the Analy kids from Operation 1-4-1. We had an anatomy unit in PE that covered the functions of muscles and bones, and an optional health class was offered as an elective my eighth grade year.
On the other end of the spectrum, eighth graders at Twin Hills, a charter middle school that typically attracts families in the wealthier spectrum, had sex and drug ed for the entirety of the year, with one semester of 45-minute sex ed classes every other day, and another semester of drug ed classes every other day. Maya Boone, a 2011 Twin Hills graduate, remembered that in the sex ed class, they talked about contraceptives, birth control types, how to put a condom on, and “the difference between love and sex and how the two aren’t necessarily connected.” This tied in with conversations about peer pressure and consent, and how saying no, and respecting other people’s no’s, are important aspects of a healthy relationship. Maya said that Operation 1-4-1 never presented, but that topics in the drug ed class ranged from discussions about not abusing prescriptions to the effects of long-term cigarette use.
There could be a number of variables influencing the discrepancy between the programs at the two middle schools, but school budget seems a probable factor.
As we know, learning about being safe and responsible around sex and sexual interactions is a crucial part of maturity, and having access to that in a supportive, educational environment surely has a positive impact on individuals. The difference in the amount of sex and drug education between Brook Haven and Twin Hills is unacceptable.
Coming into high school as a freshman, the experience wasn’t much better. The “Secrets” assembly during freshman year covered safe sex, needle sharing, and resisting peer pressure, and there were a number of presentations in my history class concerning birth control use and discussions on teen sexuality and gender identity. Unfortunately, these interactions weren’t backed up, weren’t continued out of those 50-minute segments. There was nothing to reinforce the information learned, so for most of us, it soon disappeared, replaced by the more pressing matters of extracurriculars and what was for lunch.
Fortunately, a new program is being instated in the West Sonoma County Union School District, one that ideally means comprehensive sex ed for kids in grades four through twelve. During a recent conversation with Superintendent Dr. Steven Kellner, I learned about the program and its goals. These include working with the West County Health Centers to provide helpful information to students, which means continued presentations to freshmen. The main goal of the program, according to Dr. Kellner, is to both provide students with the “skills necessary to protect [their] sexual and reproductive health from unintended pregnancy and STDs, and to encourage pupils to develop healthy attitudes concerning adolescent growth and development, body image, gender roles, sexual orientation, dating, marriage, and family.”
In my conversation with Dr. Kellner, I was originally told the program would involve fourth to twelfth graders, but when asked, he responded that the curriculum will reach ninth graders this fall. It is of paramount importance that sex ed reach students at an early age, something that can hopefully be instated in our district as soon as possible. Not only does age 8 or 9, the time most kids enter fourth grade, mark the early physical changes brought by puberty for a majority of students, but emotional changes occur as well. It is around this time that kids start looking at their siblings or older friends, mimicking their behaviors in order to figure out who they themselves are. If role models at home and in the community don’t exemplify safe, caring relationships and interactions– and even if they do– school should be a safe space to learn the necessary tools for a healthy lifestyle.
One of the most important topics in any sex ed curriculum is consent. It’s been a hot topic in the news and on social media, in light of the assaults occurring with increased frequency on high school and college campuses. This is a prime example of why starting the education process when students are young is important. Our habits are created early in life, and the longer we engage with them, the harder they are to break. If kids learn about active consent early in their educational career, and it’s continually reinforced over the years, it will be second nature to follow their habit when it actually applies later in life. If access to sex ed is limited, the tools needed for healthy relationships and safe sexual interactions may not be there, leading to dysfunctional interactions all around. I recently had an unpleasant interaction myself, in which I overheard some boys talking casually about one of their friends having assaulted someone at a party. This kind of conversation only perpetuates the “normalcy” of rape, and increases the number of people who think that sex without consent is OK.
The National Sexual Violence Resource Center reports that 1 in 5 women and 1 in 16 men are sexually assaulted while in college; that’s 20% and 6%, respectively. Neither of these proportions are reasonable. If we teach nine year-old students that no means no, that active “yes”s are necessary, that a healthy, relationship is one where everyone is comfortable and happy, then perhaps those numbers can decrease. High school sex ed is important, but habits are already formed by then. Let’s head this off at the pass, and start teaching sex ed when it’s most important.