BY LINDA CAGNETTI
The Cincinnati Enquirer
When I wrote about sex education, I never expected to get such an education myself.
By reporting on Oct. 25 how the Ohio Department of Education plans to covertly expand health and sex education in schools, I unknowingly grabbed hold of an exploding firecracker. (Oct. 25 column)
I urged readers to call their elected representatives and ask questions. They did.
There were outraged official denials and protests, hundreds of phone calls and letters from readers, and last week, the Ohio General Assembly voted to air the plans in public hearings.
It has been a continuing lesson in sexual politics. Parents and taxpayers should take notes.
The Ohio Department of Education (ODOE) and Board of Education want to institutionalize a new Health and Physical Education Model for all schools. At the same time, the Department of Education and Ohio Department of Health, with public money from the federal Centers for Disease Control (CDC), have been training teachers and other "trainers" in graphic and controversial sex ed programs intended to "fit" with the model. State-mandated sex education, rejected by Ohio in the 1970s and '80s, is now being done through regulatory powers of the state agencies,
by-passing the legislature and public scrutiny.
The ODOE denies links between a health model and CDC-sanctioned sex-ed training in prevention of pregnancy and HIV - STDs. The CDC programs include condom education in early grades; class demonstrations with "woodies" (wooden models) and other sex paraphernalia; and "intercourse alternatives" such as oral and anal sex, couple masturbation, and heavy petting.
But contrary to the denial of any link between CDC and the state model, numerous state documents dating from 1993 show "competency-based" health standards for schools are part of the "infrastructure" needed to deliver "comprehensive" health and social services to schools. One document outlines a pyramid plan "to reach every Ohio student, K-12" using the sanctioned programs. Why spend thousands of dollars in training if there is no plan to use it? And why spend two years on a model if it's not mandatory, as state board members rush to claim?
Local school leaders say they pay great attention to state standards because they're tied to accreditation and money. The models require curriculum that "fit" them. The ODOE "recommends" and provides guidance to programs that will fit the model and attract federal money. "Voluntary" soon becomes mandatory because districts can't reasonably say no to state and federal pressure and money. "It's an incestuous web," said one teacher who has taught health classes for a decade.
Nobody disagrees with improving children's health and learning. But when you connect the dots among many agency documents, it looks like a masterful agenda to deliver national health care and social services through schools. This is more than just condoms -- it's a massive policy shift for public education and more government control of children.
Meanwhile, the proposed health model has been edited for
public and state board review. All instruction activities have been deleted, awaiting a more complete version later for schools. Words have been neutered to numbing vagueness. But the intent and purpose is the same: Open a window through which an array of health and social services can be delivered to students. Records indicate that Ohio's departments of education and health and numerous social service agencies plan to remake the health landscape using schools. I don't question their dedication, only their methods and goals.
The reward is federal health care money -- billions in Medicaid, welfare and other dollars are being funneled to children's health and social services. The target is school-based clinics, with unlimited health and social services. Sex education and other controversial plans are neatly bundled among immunizations, dental care and other good intentions that pave the way for federal government overreach into local schools, abuse of privacy, undermining of many families' values and a direct assault on local control of schools.
Because it's done by bureaucratic fiat, most people don't know about it.
Many parents called or wrote that they don't know what their schools teach in sex education and they're fogged or intimidated when they ask. Two "outraged" professional health educators in local districts called to say I had no clue what teens today really need; two students wondered, "What's the fuss, they've long had this kind of sex ed in schools?"
The "fuss" is a direct challenge to parents' authority. It's a fight over whether the state or parents decide what children should be taught. It's a fight over monopoly access to the nation's school children and the ability to shape their sexual attitudes, standards, morality and behavior. It's obvious from the money trail which side has been winning.
Billions of our tax dollars go to "safe sex" and "family planning" programs, with a pittance for abstinence education.
My recent sex education includes this lesson: Parents, grandparents and others who care about children shouldn't blindly trust their moral and sexual development to schools.
Linda Cagnetti is deputy editorial page editor of The Enquirer. Email her at letters@enquirer.com or call (513) 768-8527, fax (513) 768-8610 or write 312 Elm St., Cincinnati, Ohio 45202.
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