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37 °F Forecast | Road Cams Thursday, December 16, 2004 Today's News | Classifieds | Autos | Homes | Jobs | Tempo | Health | Community | Home Delivery SECTIONS Home Page Local News Sports Business Obituaries Life Opinion - Politics Tempo AP News Weather Classified Archives Site Map SPECIAL SECTIONS Since We Asked Outdoor Journal Menu Guide How To Guide Wellness Connection Readers' Choice Real Estate Showcase Joy Magazine Homelife Magazine Wedding Guide Passport to the Rogue Valley EXTRA Newspaper in Education Personals Movie Times TV Times E The People MARKETPLACE Find a Car Find a Home Find a Job Classifieds Place an ad eSouthernOregon Automotive Communities Entertainment Publications Recreation Calendar CUSTOMER SERVICE Frequent Questions Advertising Information Home Delivery Employment Contact Us Media Kit Network Affiliate Oregon Road Conditions & Cams Email Story to a Friend November 11, 2004 Sex education expert brings message home By BILL KETTLER Mail Tribune When it comes to sex education, Doug Kirby knows what works and what doesn’t. The California educator has evaluated hundreds of sex education programs in a career that spans 26 years, and he came to Medford Wednesday to share what he knows with teachers, school administrators and school board members. Encouraging teens to abstain from intercourse is the best approach, Kirby said, but those who choose to be sexually active need accurate and comprehensive information to avoid pregnancy and sexually transmitted diseases. Programs that include role-playing exercises are the most effective, Kirby told a group of about 50 people at Medford’s Central Library. To drive home his point, Kirby engaged his audience in an exercise about the consequences of having sex without contraception. To begin, he explained that couples who do not use contraception have about a one in six chance of getting pregnant in any given month. Speaking as he would to a group of teens, he said, "Now I know most of you are not having sex, but for the sake of this exercise I want you to assume you’re all having sex." Advertisement Then he asked everyone in the audience to pick a number between one and six, and held up a red paper bag that represented a pregnancy test. He reached in, pulled out a piece of paper and then asked everyone who had chosen the number 3 to stand. "You are now pregnant," he announced. Then he picked another number, and asked everyone who had picked 5 to stand, and so on until everyone in the audience was standing. An exercise like that, Kirby said, makes pregnancy far more real to teens than sitting through a lecture about the abstract probability of getting pregnant. "If someone tells you in the classroom that you might get pregnant if you have sex, it’s not like having a friend who got pregnant and is really upset about it," he said. Teaching about sex in public schools remains controversial, although Oregon law requires public schools to provide "age-appropriate" information to students about sexually transmitted diseases. While Kirby spoke, several protesters stood outside the library carrying larger-than-life photos of aborted fetuses. Steve Raycraft of Jackson County Right to Life said teaching teens anything other than strict abstinence only encourages them to have sex. He said the approach favored by Kirby gives teens "mixed messages" because it discusses contraception as well as abstinence. Raycraft said sex education of the kind advocated by Kirby views teens as "carnal creatures" and ignores their ability to rise beyond animal impulses to a higher, spiritual level. Marc Salvatore of Josephine County Right to Life said parents should get to decide what kind of sex education their children receive. Inside the library, Kirby noted that only a few sex-education programs have been evaluated scientifically to determine whether they achieved the goal of changing teens’ sexual behavior. Among those that have been scientifically reviewed, three focused on abstinence only, but none of those programs postponed the age at which teens became sexually active or reduced the incidence of sexually transmitted diseases. He cautioned that his findings do not mean a successful abstinence-only program does not exist — only that it has not yet been evaluated scientifically. Even the most effective programs reduce teen sexual activity only by about one-third, he said. "But if we can reduce teen pregnancy and sexually transmitted diseases by one-third, that would be enormously effective." Sex ed funding declines Support for tax-funded, sexuality education in public schools fell in Grants Pass and Medford between 2002 and 2003, a new survey shows. Still, nearly 70 percent of residents surveyed said they believed such information is vital for young people. The study, conducted by Northwest Survey and Data Services for Planned Parenthood Health Services of Southwest Oregon, revealed that support for sex ed in public schools fell from about 82 percent in 2002 to more than 72 percent in 2003. More than a quarter of the 159 people surveyed in 2003 believed sex ed did not belong in schools. The percentage of people who believed tax money should be spent on sex ed fell from nearly 74 percent in 2002 to about 69 percent in 2003. Nearly everyone who participated in the survey, including 168 people in 2002, agreed that the classes should rely on medically accurate information. That number declined, however, with more than 92 percent of people supporting medically accurate information in 2003, down from nearly 95 percent in 2002. Opinions about what sex ed should include changed between 2002 and 2003 as well. Percentages of people who said information should be offered about sexually transmitted diseases, HIV and AIDS fell from 98 percent to 94 percent. Support for information about reproduction fell from 94 percent to 90 percent, while support for information about condoms fell from 92 percent to 86 percent. Support for information about love declined from 88 percent to 82 percent. The only issue on which views remained constant was abortion, with 66 percent of those surveyed in both years saying it should be included in sex ed curriculum. — JoNel Aleccia Reach reporter Bill Kettler at 776-4492, or e-mail [email protected] Mail Tribune Home Local News | Sports | Business | Obituaries | Life Opinion - Politics | AP News | Archives | Site Map E Southern Oregon | Classified Copyright © 1997-2004 Mail Tribune. All rights reserved. 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