Regarding SB1142

Testimony to the Senate Committee on Education

by Jane Jimenez, parent and educator

Monday, February 17

Madam Chairman and Members of the Committee:

As a former elementary teacher, I taught the AIDS curriculum for 5^th grade students at my school in Gilbert.  With a son and daughter moving into college, I began to pay close attention to discussions on sex education and to educate myself about the variety of issues involved.

On the face of it Senate Bill 1142 seems quite harmless.  It seems to address a straight-forward issue:  medical accuracy.  Who could object to that?

My first question is the most basic of all.  Why is the law necessary? We only create laws when we have problems that cannot be addressed satisfactorily by a group of people around the table.  A proposed law implies there is a problem. 

In a most literal sense, this law makes me think there is a school out there that refuses to be accurate.  Someone found a mistake in their program.  A bad statistic.  Or inaccurate terminology.  They went to the school, to the teacher, to the curriculum director, and finally, to the school board.  And the school refused to fix the problem.  The gavel hit the table, and the school board ruled.  “We don’t care if we’re accurate.  We refuse to be accurate.  We’re happy being inaccurate.”

My experience as an educator has convinced me of one thing.  Schools put the highest premium on accuracy…in all curriculum areas…and most especially when dealing with something as highly controversial as sex education. 

My own Tempe High School District has worked out a detailed board policy on sex education supported by intense curriculum review and staff training.  It is much like my own staff training nearly 10 years ago in Gilbert regarding the AIDS curriculum.  The curriculum is specific, and educators are given concrete guidelines about what information is to be covered, down to the details of terminology used in teaching. 

On Friday, I also made a personal visit to Planned Parenthood, speaking about this bill with Britta Booth, Director of Education.  I asked her if she was aware of specific instances in Arizona where schools are presenting medically inaccurate information.  No specific Arizona examples were provided. [ last sentence is correction of original testimony]

And, what if someone does find an inaccuracy in a program?  What options currently exist to correct the problem?  In a day of site-based management, with parent advisory boards, open meetings, and access to Board members, where is the specific instance that someone in Arizona has been unable to correct an inaccuracy in some classroom lesson? 

In my visit with Ms. Booth, she guided me to two national reports.  One by Martha Kempner is available on the SIECUS website.  When I visited the SIECUS website, one of the prominent reports listed on its home page was titled, “Nationwide Advocacy Campaign Launched to Fight Increased Federal Funding for Unproven Abstinence-Only-Until-Marriage Programs.” 

In brief, this SIECUS report is part of a continuing divisive battle between those who belief medically accurate information on sex leads us to advocate, support, and teach abstinence to school-age children and those who believe we should actively promote and teach the use of condoms and birth control to school-age children.

In the packet I have provided, page 1 provides exerts from a brochure mailed throughout the nation last year by the national Planned Parenthood office.

Simply put, this brochure is an attack on abstinence education funded by the federal government through Title V[1].  This brochure is an expensive effort focused on eliminating this abstinence education[2] and its funding all together.

One disturbing element of this attack is its obvious disregard for the truth.  If one believes the presentation on this brochure, abstinence educators provide no information on birth control and no information on STDs. 

In truth, I have had the opportunity to review many national curricula at the 2001 Abstinence Clearinghouse conference and at last summer’s national conference for the Medical Institute of Sexual Health (MISH).  At the MISH conference, one full day was devoted to the latest research and information on STDs and AIDS presented by practicing physicians, each of them a specialist in the particular disease being presented.  Hundreds of national abstinence educators, many of them medical professionals, doctors and nurses, took copious notes and handouts for updating their curricula and training staff in their home states. 

            Even more significantly, the Planned Parenthood brochure uses “medically accurate” at least 8 times.  It appears that, according to the brochure, a program is only considered medically accurate if it presents information on birth control.  What does this mean?  If abstinence education does address risk and effectiveness, then one concludes this is a call to provide classroom instruction on how to use birth control and condoms.

            This debate is not about “accuracy” as the average person would think of accuracy.  It is about “adequacy”, a redefinition that says a curriculum is “inadequate” unless it includes instruction on how to use birth control and condoms.  Medical accuracy is really being used by some as code language for teaching the use of birth control and condoms.

            Why wouldn’t a person in favor of including birth control in public school sex education simply say so?  Why redefine this in terms of “accuracy”?  Most importantly, what possible significance could this have for SB1142?

On page 4 of the handout[3], you will read about a school district in Jacksonville, Florida, and their five-year legal battle.  In April 1992, Planned Parenthood of Florida took the lead in a lawsuit against Duval County schools, charging that the abstinence program they purchased was medically inaccurate.  Among other things, Planned Parenthood and its supporters, using the charge of “medical accuracy”, wanted the program to present detailed birth control information.

            Only slightly more than one year into the lawsuit the school district amassed legal costs of $50,000.  School Board Member Cheryl Donelan noted, “…we’re only up to a motion to dismiss.  We certainly haven’t gotten very far.”[4]  In an attempt to come to grips with its individual problems, The Duval County School Board “sued the state Department of Education because it did not set rules for school systems grappling with sex education curriculums, in a case that could affect [Florida] schools statewide.”[5]

Finally, Duval County gathered a large community task force to construct its own in-house sex education curriculum based on community standards.  Four years after being sued, in 1996 they finally had a program for teaching abstinence until marriage as the expected standard for students.  The community task force rejected teaching the use of birth control.  They were back where they started in 1991…except for the very expensive and draining process of litigation.

Could SB1142 actually lay the foundation for suing schools rather than working with and helping schools?  Duval County’s sex education program is not the only to be challenged through lawsuit. 

            In truth, I suggest that SB1142 will set up schools and abstinence educators to defend ambiguous questions where honest individuals can have a difference of opinion based on scientifically valid information.  Will schools be forced to defend their choice of authorities, the “weight” of supporting evidence, and the need for peer review journals?  What does “if appropriate” mean…and who decides when appropriate is really appropriate? 

Even data from the CDC is discounted by some.  In 2000, the National Institutes of Health under the CDC issued a report on an extensive review of the major studies on condoms and STDs.  Their review panel was comprised of 28 national medical experts.

In spite of the scientific credibility of the CDC, there is significant political wrangling as to how to use their results.  You can find experts who think this is the most important study since the sexual revolution began while other experts refuse to acknowledge the study at all, claiming a lack of definitive scientific information.

Will these disagreements end up in court at a great expense to our schools?  Who will win these disagreements?  Schools that are facing the most serious budget problems ever? Or deep-pocketed national organizations that object to the very principle of promoting abstinence education as provided for by federal legislation?

While the intent of those supporting SB1142 may be to promote accuracy in sex education, the current law already provides an opportunity for schools to have curriculum reviewed by the Department of Health Services or the Department of Education.  As of yet, there is no demonstrable evidence that schools are failing to be accurate.

Consider the expansive use of “medical accuracy” to dictate curriculum content, including lessons on the use of birth control and condoms, and consider the experience of Duval County, Florida.  Clearly, in application, SB1142 can potentially be used as a vehicle to destroy a particular sex education program through legal nitpicking and intimidation. 

In truth, parents, community members, medical experts, and educators have demonstrated a long history of operating their schools, developing curricula, and of resolving questions through intelligent discussion and compromise.  I see no evidence that this process is failing.

            I urge you to vote no on SB1142.