Word: mclennan
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After years of high teen-pregnancy rates in McLennan County, a publicly funded group has mounted a controversial community-wide crackdown on teen sex known as "abstinence-only education." Its proponents argue that giving kids an unambiguous abstinence message--rather than telling them to wait but distributing condoms for when they don't--will curb teen pregnancies, decrease the spread of sexually transmitted diseases (STDs) and make for "sexually healthier" adults. And they warn against a strain of human papilloma virus that is linked to cervical cancer--and is not prevented by condoms. Opponents of abstinence-only education, however, call...
...assembly time at La Vega High School in McLennan County, Texas, and a roomful of juniors and seniors is talking about the facts of life. "From this day forward, what's going to be too far for you?" asks traveling lecturer Eric Tooley, as he distributes a work sheet on "physical affection" that begins with talking and holding hands and progresses right through to sexual intercourse. "Circle the things you're not going to do until marriage." As the students finish up their assignment, Tooley makes clear his own preference: "Virginity is a gift you get to give away only...
...campaign trail. As Governor, he has poured $6 million into abstinence programs. And he has pledged that if elected President, he would allocate some $135 million, or the amount the government now spends on contraception programs, to "elevate abstinence education from an afterthought to an urgent priority." Accordingly, McLennan County is being watched as a bellwether...
...McLennan County, that message shows up everywhere from hard candies emblazoned SEX IS MINT FOR MARRIAGE to pledge cards asking kids to forswear sex. At La Vega, Tooley delivers a stern lecture on the ineffectiveness of condoms, telling students the devices fail to protect against hiv anywhere from 10% to 43% of the time (as opposed to the 1% failure rate claimed by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention when condoms are used properly). Students view graphic slides of a uterus before and after the onset of pelvic inflammatory disease. At a recent abstinence class for seventh- and eighth...
...quell such worries, some educators and policymakers are embracing more comprehensive sex education. Waco public schools, which comprise the largest school district in McLennan County, declined the federal and state grant money for abstinence-only education and opted instead for a curriculum that includes information about contraceptives. Some schools in Minnesota have a dual-track sex-ed system, in which parents choose between an abstinence-only class and one that includes instruction in other ways of preventing pregnancy and STDs. And in Missouri and California, new laws require sex education to be "medically accurate" in portraying the effectiveness of contraceptives...