The Problem in Texas on Sex Ed

Given the news earlier this month about shockingly high rates of multiple births to teens in Texas (see here and here), we thought we’d share (again) data from this year’s Texas Freedom Network Education Fund report about sexuality education in Texas public schools. What are Texas school districts teaching students about responsible pregnancy and disease […]

Read More…

First Amendment? Not in Mississippi

Texas isn’t the only state that is constitutionally challenged. In fact, Mississippi is giving us a run for our money when it comes to (willful?) ignorance about what the First Amendment means. Earlier this summer, our friends at Advocates for Youth brought us the disturbing tale of an abstinence-only rally/evangelical prayer meeting sponsored by the […]

Read More…

Don’t Buy the Lie

From a message being circulated to a far-right e-mail list in Texas today: “(T)he teen pregnancy rate is certainly not the fault of abstinence-only sex education programs but is instead the outgrowth of prolific contraceptive sex education programs.” The facts say otherwise: Texas has one of the highest teen birth rates in the country (and […]

Read More…

Defeating Ignorance, AIDS and Teen Pregnancy

A Texas Freedom Network Education Fund report released in February revealed that more than nine in 10 Texas school districts teach students nothing about responsible pregnancy and disease prevention when it comes to sex except for abstinence-only-until-marriage. One of the most common strategies in abstinence-only curricula, the study’s authors found, was wildly exaggerating the failure […]

Read More…

Always Pushing the ‘Culture Wars’

Let’s see if we have this right. The Texas Legislature adjourned last week without passing legislation to keep five state agencies — including the Texas Department of Transportation and the Texas Department of Insurance — operating after Sept. 1, 2010. So now Gov. Rick Perry says he is going to call lawmakers back for a special […]

Read More…