AUSTIN, Texas — Austin Independent School District leaders will present the proposed changes to the human sexuality and responsibility curriculum Monday night at special board meeting and work session.
- Been more than 10 years since last revision
- Curriculum is broken down into 7 categories
District officials said it has been more than a decade since the sex education curriculum was revised.
“A lot has changed in our world since then. There are new standards that are out there, there’s new research that are out there, and just the life that our students live is very different, with media, technology, and everything else that’s available to them today,” said Kathy Ryan, director of academics for AISD.
The curriculum before the board of trustees is broken down into seven categories: anatomy and physiology, identity, healthy relationships, personal safety, puberty and adolescent development, pregnancy and reproduction, and sexually transmitted diseases and HIV. The changes could affect students as early as in the third grade. For example, a third grade student would learn that men and women have different anatomies.
“We’re talking about an introduction, and it’s important to give them those names so they can speak about them as needed with their parents, family members. Sometimes families and kids have nicknames for body parts and in the sad time when someone needs to make outcry, if they’re not naming the actual body part, sometimes that outcry is not interpreted as an outcry,” Ryan said.
AISD’s November survey elicited responses from almost 6,000 community members, almost 80 percent of respondents were from parents. Respondents had to decide which proposed standard was appropriate for each grade level.
“We looked at the places where there were was some concern or there was not as overwhelming percentage saying, ‘Yes, This is great. Teach this at this grade level.’ And looked at, depending on what it was, where might be a great placement for it. In many cases we moved it to align with survey results. There were a couple of places because of other things happening in the curriculum and other things in school life that we’re aware of, that we put it somewhere else,” Ryan said.
For example, Ryan acknowledged there were a number of survey respondents who did not want lessons about gender identity and expression to be taught in the third or fifth grade.
“We still felt it was important to align with AISD’s policy of ‘all are welcome’ and safe schools for everybody to have an awareness out there, that people have different identities and we need to respect that,” Ryan said.
Karen Rayne is an AISD parent and the executive director of Unhushed, which creates sexual education curriculum. Rayne is a sex educator and author, who believes the district is moving in the right direction. While Rayne said she has no problem talking to her kids about sexuality and responsibility, she believes important to have sex education in schools.
“[Kids] really need to have those conversations with their friends, and with the other people in their grade and they need to have those conversations across gender lines, so that they can feel like they’re empowered and competent when the moment comes when that conversation is necessary,” Rayne said.
Rayne agrees with the district about keeping identity in the curriculum and believes it will help young people with decision making.
“Whether someone is flirting, or coming onto someone else, or asking them out on a date, pretty much all of those things are going to be based on assumptions on gender, so gender has to be a part of the conversation,” Rayne said.
Other Austin ISD parents, including David Walls, the vice president of Texas Values, believes the conversation about sexuality should be kept at home.
“These are things that parents, that families should be discussing, your faith community should be providing input on these things. It’s not the role of the school to step in and override these very sensitive topics,” Walls said. “These standards do promote a viewpoint that says your biology is not determined by your sex.”
Walls also criticized AISD’s online survey, saying the only place for parents to indicate if they felt a certain standard was not appropriate entirely was in the comment sections.
“I hope that any public school would be looking to partner with parents in educating their children, not forcing their agenda over or instead of what the parent is trying to do,” Walls said.
The board is expected to vote on the proposed changes on February 25. If approved, parents will have the opportunity to look at the lesson plans in August.