NC Sex Education Lacks Regulation
CHARLOTTE, NC– Teaching your kids about sex. North Carolina state law says public schools have to educate children about abstinence and safe sex. But as WCCB Charlotte discovered, nobody is regulating the curriculum.
It’s difficult to find an up-to-date sex education video online. Also difficult: finding a teacher willing to talk about what they teach your kids about sex.
“It might be community push back, and it might be, ‘I did something wrong,’ or the school board doesn’t support them or the principal doesn’t support them for what they did,” said Dr. Deb Kaclick with CMS.
Dr. Deb Kaclick taught sex education in Charlotte Mecklenburg Schools for 17 years. She agrees it’s tough to know what your kids are actually learning, despite a strong state law that mandates the subject.
The law says local schools have to teach abstinence as the expected standard, that it’s the only certain means of avoiding pregnancy and STDs, and they must teach strategies for remaining abstinent.
In 1996, the state began requiring schools also teach safe sex: contraceptives and disease prevention. But it’s up to individual school districts to decide what is taught.
“And I think that most districts do to the best of their ability. I think there are certain school districts that don’t either out of fear out of time,” said Dr. Ellen Essick, Ph.D.
North Carolina Department of Public Instruction’s Dr. Ellen Essick makes sure schools know the guidelines. But she says no one regulates the curriculum and there are no consistent teaching materials across the state.
So I called and wrote every school district in the WCCB Charlotte viewing area. CMS has a standardized program across all schools from 6-12th grade.
Many counties like Burke, Catawba, Cabarrus, along with cities like Hickory and Newton-Conover, teach abstinence and safe sex.
Alexander, Gaston, Rowan and Caldwell Counties, along with Salisbury and Boone told me they received my email, but never gave me an answer on what they teach.
Whatever it is, has to be medically accurate. Lawmakers mandated that in 2009, making North Carolina one of just 13 states with that stipulation.
“If they’re not going to get that information from a credible resource, that’s a scary thing,” said Dr. Kaclick.
Which some say beats the alternative of teaching nothing at all.
Teen pregnancy in Mecklenburg County is down 50 percent since the law mandating schools teach safe sex went into effect. The latest numbers available show more than 1,000 pregnant teens in the county in 2013.
Parents who don’t want schools to teach their child sex ed can sign a waiver to opt them out.
