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The Oracle

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Sexual education curriculum requires continuation of current efforts toward LGBT+ inclusion

Sexual education curriculum requires continuation of current efforts toward LGBT+ inclusion

One of the most practical classes students at South will take in their four years is Health Education. While the Health curriculum covers many kinds of safety, among the most pivotal sets of topics students learn about is sexual health. Despite South’s Health teachers having made commendable improvements regarding inclusion to the Health curriculum, it is likely that not all students are receiving the information they need to practice safer sex because some may have a different sexual orientation and will thus have different sexual encounters.

The Health Education curriculum in the Glenbrooks, as in most schools, is geared primarily toward heterosexual (straight) relationships. Over the last year, however, Health teachers have been making some effort toward using more inclusive language, and the Oracle’s Editorial Board believes taking this step, which the vast majority of schools haven’t, puts South on a path toward becoming a beacon of LGBT inclusion. In order to make an inclusive atmosphere more prevalent, though, we suggest that the Health department, in coordination with the administration, consider incorporating more LGBT-specific information into the existing curriculum.

According to Health teachers Laura Duffy, Courtney Middleton, Kelley Douglas, John Skorupa and Dana Boehmer, the Health department has made strides, especially within the last year, to be more conscious of the way they talk about relationships. Using terminology like “partners” instead of heteronormative language* has created a more inclusive and accepting environment for students of all orientations. The Editorial Board strongly believes that this has been a critical step to better educating more students, making more of the health curriculum ring true for students of different sexual orientations.

“I haven’t noticed any difference in the way kids respond [to the change in language] besides the fact that they are very receptive to us talking like that,” Middleton said. “I start the unit by saying: ‘figure out how this applies to you. You’re going to hear me say ‘partners’ a lot, and when I say partner, don’t assume I’m talking about a male and a female’…This helps [students] understand how it

relates to [them] in [their] own personal lives.”

Despite the increased student receptiveness to the more inclusive use of language Health teachers have observed, a non-scientific Oracle-conducted survey of 50 first semester Health students indicated that 62 percent of students did not recall there being discussion around safe sexual practices for LGBT encounters. An additional eight percent recall some discussion, but did not believe it was substantial enough.

“There wasn’t really any discussion about safe sexual practices for homosexual couples,” Anna Bundy, first semester sophomore Health student, said. “I think it only came up once in a video very briefly. There was definitely no discussion of safe sex for female same-sex couples, which is concerning.”

Nobody is to blame for not having already integrated an LGBT-specific sexual education into the current Health curriculum.  In fact, according to Illinois House Bill 2675 (August 2013), “Course material shall teach honor and respect for monogamous heterosexual relationships.” By this standard, the Health department is already on the leading edge of inclusion of the LGBT community because of its heightened sensitivity to language.

On the other hand, there can be more done to increase students’ knowledge of steps to safer sex they may have. It is the responsibility our educators and administrators must assume to amend the curriculum in order to increase the safety of the students that come through South and the people with whom they will have sexual encounters, even if not everybody is in agreement ideologically about LGBTQ+ issues.

The Editorial Board recognizes the difficulty in addressing the multiple different kinds of relationships that exist within the LGBT community, but it is a necessary step to provide all students with applicable information to a variety of experiences. Relative to heterosexual sexual experiences, LGBT sexual encounters differ mechanically, have different rates of STI transmission and require different steps to ensure sexual safety.

Just as the existing Health curriculum distinguishes rates of STI transmission based upon race and socioeconomic status, it is equally important to do so for the LGBT community. For instance, HIV is four times as prevalent within the transgender community as it is in heterosexual relationships between two cisgender** people, according to a National Transgender Discrimination Survey report.

The rate of syphilis contraction in men who have sex with other men (whether they identify as gay, bisexual or heterosexual) is not only higher than it is for heterosexuals but also growing faster than it is in the heterosexual community, the Center for Disease Control (CDC) reported. And steps to increase safety during sexual experiences differ between WSW (women who have sex with women), WSM (women who have sex with men) and MSM (men who have sex with men).

In order to increase the effectiveness of Health Education, the CDC explicitly endorsed “developing resources to help school staff understand the special concerns and needs of LGBT youth [and] providing training for district and school staff to ensure that health curricula are inclusive of and relevant to LGBT students,” according to its Youth Risk Behavior Survey.

While some students or parents might feel that incorporation of LGBT-specific material may not apply to them or their child(ren), respectively, students may have experiences in high school or beyond that may or may not be congruent with their sexual orientations. Stated alternatively, a student may not identify as gay or lesbian, but they may be having or eventually have same-sex sexual encounters. For this reason, all students must be made aware of the different steps to safe sex and levels of risk for STI transmission, depending on their current and/or future partner(s).

In order for the Health teachers to meaningfully deliver this critical information and make it relevant to students, it is important to use a standard vocabulary within the department. Skorupa explained that this kind of instruction is difficult because it provokes questions about sexuality.

“Here’s where the struggles come in with teaching [to students with varying sexual preferences]: Is it a situation? Is it a preference? Is it an orientation?” Skorupa said. “There are so many terms being thrown around right now…Until somebody comes up with some very clear boundaries of what we’re supposed to say, it is difficult for every teacher to then find the right terminology based on that situation.”

The Editorial Board understands that changes to the curriculum do not come overnight;  it is a process that occurs on a semester-by-semester basis. According to Skorupa, nailing down precise standards with respect to elements like the vocabulary teachers should be using can be challenging. As administrators and Health teachers responsible for curricular change reassess the sexual education curriculum as the Editorial Board hope they do, we urge them to include students as a part of this change process.

In an interview the Health department had with the Oracle, they suggested that, if LGBT-specific material is to be included in the curriculum, it would be worthwhile to consult students through the usage of focus groups to understand what educational material and language registers as most meaningful to students. We support this action as a feature of the curricular change process. By leveraging students’ opinions, instructors will be more successful in standardizing the language used when talking about different kinds of relationships so that as many people in the classroom as possible, teachers included, will be comfortable with this sort of discussion.

The world has become a far more accepting place of members of the LGBT community in recent years, and much of that has to do with how LGBT students are treated and accepted in schools. However, instead of solely frowning upon exclusionary remarks or actions, it is time to institutionalize inclusion by equipping all students, given the assumption that anybody is capable of having a same-sex sexual encounter, with the information they need to be safe in their sexual practices. This will only occur with the collaboration of administration, Health teachers and input from the very students whose lives these curricular changes will impact.

*Heteronormative language is language that assumes all of a given audience is heterosexual (straight) and that promotes straight relationships as the primary type of relationship.

 **Cisgender refers to a person who identifies with the gender they were assigned at birth.

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