FORT LAUDERDALE, Fla. – The Broward County School Board has taken on several controversial topics recently.
Tuesday’s meeting topic was how sex education will be taught.
Some of the public speakers displayed a lot of passion, so much so that the meeting took a recess while order could be put in place.
“The percentage of students who reported having had sexual intercourse in 2019, before they graduated high school, was 19% in 9th grade,” said Ebony Crispin, with the AIDS Healthcare Foundation.
Numbers and science were tossed into a conversation that has been brewing for a while.
“When you bring up the subject of HIV and AIDS and STDs, we also want the subject of condoms brought up at the same time,” said committee member Carolyn Krohn.
That’s something apparently not in the current curriculum.
There was also concern over what else students will learn.
“(In) ninth grade, you have role-playing activities where the teacher is asking your children to decide if they are ready for oral or anal sex,” said concerned parent Nicole Morris.
In August, the school board sent out a survey in order to get a sense of what parents were comfortable with.
In one question, the majority of parents said they were comfortable with HIV/AIDS education, as well as information over sexually transmitted diseases at the middle school level.
The majority of parents surveyed also agreed gender identity and sexual orientation should be taught in high school.
After an hour and a half of passionate debate Tuesday, the school board voted 5-4 in favor of keeping the sex-ed curriculum as is.
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