Scarleteen

Hey there,

So...I think I might be crazy, but I want to start a proactive sexual ed club at my high school. I want to do something a lot like what scarletteen does online, but as a club instead. I'm really excited by the idea, but I'm a little overwhelmed by the vastness of the topic and the potential backlash I could get from immature students or conservative teachers or parents. I don't wish to promote teen sex, but to educate teens on things like safe sex, consent, STIs, healthy vs. unhealthy relationships, etc. and to provide students with a space where they can ask whatever questions they have about sex, since I know many students who don't have someone they trust to go to for that.

What kind of advice can you guys give me for this? Anything would help whether it's how to present it to the school, get it started, topics I need to cover, or any ideas you might have. Also, any resources you might have would be great, too, as even though I have knowledge on sex ed I'm not confident that it's extensive enough to do what I want to do.

Hey Kitten,

I think this sounds great!!!! I love hearing about youth who are actively working to bring sexual education to their communities.

A lot this might depend on attitudes and policies at your school and/or district. Having an adult sponsor could help you get an idea of what those policies might be as well as the best way to approach the group based off certain attitudes. If you can identify a staff member or teacher who feels strongly about sexual health I think they could be a great resource for navigating the process of getting the club established and keeping things running smoothly.

I also think it would be helpful to start thinking about a focus, goals, and format for your group. Would it mainly be a place to learn? How would you want that to take place? Students research and teach each other? You have educators come in from places like Planned Parenthood to work with you all? Would it be easier to get approval for the group by incorporating a service aspect? I agree, it is a lot and a lot of different directions you could take this in!

When i was in high school I belonged to a sexual health group. It didn't take place at my school, but through a local planned parenthood, however, knowing the format might give you some ideas or help you narrow your focus. In general, knowing what others have done or do (more than likely outside your school through community organizations) is a good place to start. Our primary goal was to advocate for sexual healthcare in our state. So we would lobby at the capital, speak at functions, present for youth at other organizations, create and perform plays to put on throughout the community etc. Part of our sessions focused on planning any of the things I just mentioned, the other part was focused on education. Each session we covered a new sexual health topic through an activity or presentation. A lot of time a staff member would present to us, other times we lead the presentation, but this always included discussion.

Good luck

To add, presenting why this is necessary and how teens are impacted by having/not having sexual health education is a great way to make your case. Check into stats for youth rates of pregnancies, STIS, and sexual risk behaviors in your state and/or age group. Teen dating violence as well! You can find some info through the CDC and Guttmacher Institute.

Thank you for the advice ashleah!

All of these sound like great ideas, and I feel like I want to do a bit of everything I feel like education and opening up the conversation around sex ed is one of my primary goals. However, advocacy work interests me as well, but I'm not entirely sure how to go about doing it. I'm trying to do more advocacy work in the gay-straight alliance club that I run at my school as well but since I've never done anything like it before and don't know that much about policies in my state I'm a bit overwhelmed.

I would love to work with Planned Parenthood if I can, and with other sex ed advocates in the areas. I'm just not entirely sure where to start.

No problem, there are several organizations that focus on teen (sexual) health who have information/research regarding policy and it's impact on youth. Advocates for Youth can give you a state by state breakdown, but you can check out the organizations I mentioned above.

In my experience, sex educators love to help out. Finding who is in your community and giving them a call/sending them an email to ask for advice (like you did here) should be just fine.