Posted on 02/07/2016 5:40:05 AM PST by Kaslin
The San Francisco Unified School District's board is poised to expand its Condom Availability Program for high school students into middle schools. The school district no longer offers Algebra I as an eighth-grade course -- Algebra I has been folded into a two-year, eighth-grade and ninth-grade class that is supposed to be more comprehensive. But the board is ready to bring a high school program to middle school by handing out condoms to sixth-graders.
What could possibly go wrong?
Superintendent Richard Carranza backs the proposal to distribute condoms to middle schoolers "in conjunction with a session with a school nurse or social worker to identify risk factors and provide referrals or resources as necessary." The idea, supporters say, is not to encourage preteens to have sex, but to make sure that the estimated 5 percent of San Francisco middle schoolers who are sexually active protect themselves from sexually transmitted diseases and pregnancies.
"It's not going to be like Mardi Gras," school district Director of Safety and Wellness Kevin Gogin told me. (There will be no floats with school nurses tossing out condoms.) The idea is to allow students to visit a social worker or nurse, who can ascertain if he or she is already sexually active and taking precautions. Everything is confidential unless a social worker sees a problem -- an adult sexual predator -- and sees a need to contact Child Protective Services.
Reinforcing parents' distrust
When middle schoolers are having sexual intercourse a nurse or social worker could give the student condoms and useful information. The program has been successful in city high schools, Gogin said.
Problem: If 95 percent of middle schoolers are not having sexual intercourse, why would adults want to establish a social norm of middle schoolers having sex? (A handout from the district asserts "only 5.2 percent" of middle schoolers have had sexual intercourse.") The district points to a study that found that comprehensive sex education "delayed the initiation of sex, reduced the number of sexual partners, and increased condom or contraceptive use." OK, I asked: What research is there on middle school condom distribution programs?
There is none. Gogin named another district that might be looking at implementing the same program in its middle schools. That tells me San Francisco is about to conduct a social experiment on children.
I phoned a couple of education reformers to get their take on the program. Most wanted nothing to do with the controversy. They are concentrating on what they see as the dumbing down of school curricula. I understand. It's not as if I want to write this column, but somebody's gotta do it. I reached Lisa Snell, director of education and child welfare at the libertarian-leaning Reason Foundation. She deftly questioned the "age appropriateness" of condoms at middle schools.
Many parents already distrust public schools, Snell observed, and this program simply reinforces their suspicions. Snell asked, "Why even go there?"
Answer: Because they can't help themselves. Carranza and the school board want parents to trust them on academics, but they don't trust parents to know what's wrong for their own kids.
Snell sees an unnecessary foray from public schools' "core mission." Parents send their children to public school to learn to read, to compute and to discover the science behind the world around them. According to SFUSD's own measure, only about half of San Francisco students are proficient in math and reading, while half are not. With that mediocre record in an affluent enclave, the district ought to focus on raising student achievement.
No trigger event
Gogin told me that the condom program would not take away from instructional time. If educators can't teach half of their students math, what makes them think they can teach seventh-graders sexual responsibility?
I asked Gogin if something happened to propose condom giveaways at middle school. The answer is no. The district was aware that some middle school students are sexually active. Sadly, there have been pregnancies and sexually transmitted diseases in middle schools, but no one event triggered the policy change.
That's the problem with San Francisco -- elected officials are always pushing the envelope, when nobody asked them to.
Yeah, right. The social worker wouldn't see the predator, would she, because he or she isn't going to be there in the middle school holding hands with the 12-year-old. All available information shows that the younger a sexually-active girl is, the older her male partner is.
"How old is your boyfriend, Shameika? We hand out these condoms only if he's no more than three years older than you. He's 14? Great! Have fun, dear, and come see me when you need an abortion.
Not to mention that predators would gravitate to victim-rich environments like ... social work.
Excellent point!
What a novel idea!
Giving rubbers to kiddies to show them that the government schools approve of adultery is so modern.
But can they read, write and spell?
And 1 +4= 3
What a novel idea!
Giving rubbers to kiddies to show them that the government schools approve of adultery is so modern.
The kids probably aren’t married, so I think you mean fornication.
Come on get with the program. That's not important. /s
Public schools - stupid people.
Progressives are always pushing at the margins of society's morals and ethics.
Remember!
Compulsory government socialist-entitlement schooling was a progressive idea of the 1800’s.
Progressives have always controlled teacher training and curriculum development.
Progressives have always pushed for greater and greater secularization of the government's socialist-entitment schools. By the 1960’s religion in the schools was reduced to a lukewarm nod to God in the morning followed by non-stop godlessness. Since then the worldview has been totally godless.
Finally,....Children in socialist-entitlement schools risk learning to be comfortable with socialism. Hey! If the voting mob can give a child tuition-free schooling why not use that voting mob to get lots of “free” stuff? It only took one to three generations of socialist-entitlement schooling to give the nation Woodrow Wilson and Franklin D.Roosevelt. It's been worse since then.
Of course they’re not married. Many will not marry but will sire and bear children until the cow comes home.
Speaking of the cow, how is Hillary doing?
The elderly, left-wing, hypocritical time-server seems to be doing rather badly.
Algebra is a middle school class in Asian countries.
Kids that can read, write or add are a danger to liberals as they might actually think! Instead the government run by liberal wants to lead them on a path they are not mentally or emotionally prepared to explore.
I'll give some:
You'll ruin your life!
Salt Lake City has an answer to this 'problem'...
"All of this should be conveyed without having priesthood leaders focus upon intimate matters which are a part of husband and wife relationships. Skillful interviewing and counseling can occur without discussion of clinical details by placing firm responsibility on individual members of the Church to put their lives in order before exercising the privilege of entering a house of the Lord. The First Presidency has interpreted oral sex as constituting an unnatural, impure, or unholy practice. If a person is engaged in a practice which troubles him enough to ask about it, he should discontinue it."
- Official Declaration of the First Presidency of the Church, January 5th, 1982
"Prophets anciently and today condemn masturbation. It induces feelings of guilt and shame. It is detrimental to spirituality. It indicates slavery to the flesh, not that mastery of it and the growth toward godhood which is the object of our mortal life. Our modern prophet has indicated that no young man should be called on a mission who is not free from this practice. What is more, it too often leads to grievous sin, even to that sin against nature, homosexuality. For, done in private, it evolves often into mutual masturbation-practiced with another person of the same sex and thence into total homosexuality...."
"Among the most common sexual sins our young people commit are necking and petting. Not only do these improper relations often lead to fornication, [unwed] pregnancy, and abortions - all ugly sins - but in and of themselves they are pernicious evils, and it is often difficult for youth to distinguish where one ends and another begins. They awaken lust and stir evil thoughts and sex desires. They are but parts of the whole family of related sins and indiscretions. Almost like twins, 'petting' and fornication are alike."
- Prophet Spencer W. Kimball, The Miracle of Forgiveness, page 65
"Also far-reaching is the effect of the loss of chastity. Once given or taken or stolen it can never be regained. Even in a forced contact such as rape or incest, the injured one is greatly outraged. If she has not cooperated and contributed to the foul deed, she is of course in a more favorable position. There is no condemnation where there is no voluntary participation. It is better to die in defending one's virtue than to live having lost it without a struggle."
- Prophet Spencer W. Kimball, The Miracle of Forgiveness, page 196
"And Cain said unto the Lord, My punishment is greater than I can bear. Behold, thou hast driven me out this day from the face of the earth." (Genesis 4:9-14.) That was true of murder. It is also true of illicit sex, which, of course, includes all petting, fornication, adultery, homosexual acts, and all other perversions. The Lord may say to offenders, as He did to Cain, "What hast thou done?" The children thus conceived make damning charges against you; the companions who have been frustrated and violated condemn you; the body that has been defiled cries out against you; the spirit which has been dwarfed convicts you. You will have difficulty throughout the ages in totally forgiving yourself."
-Prophet Spencer W. Kimball, "Love Versus Lust", BYU Speech January 5, 1965. Often-used quote still used today in LDS seminary classes.
"I do not find in the Bible the modern terms "petting" nor "homosexuality," yet I found numerous scriptures which forbade such acts under by whatever names they might be called. I could not find the term "homosexuality," but I did find numerous places where the Lord condemned such a practice with such vigor that even the death penalty was assessed."
- Apostle Spencer W. Kimball, "Love Versus Lust", BYU Speech January 5, 1965
"If adultery or fornication justified the death penalty in the old days, and still in Christ's day, is the sin any less today because the laws of the land do not assess the death penalty for it? Is the act less grievous? There must be a washing, a purging, a changing of attitudes, a correcting of appraisals, a strengthening toward self-mastery. There must be many prayers, and volumes of tears. There must be an inner conviction giving to the sin its full diabolical weight. There must be increased devotion and much thought and study. And this takes energy and time and often is accompanied with sore embarrassment, heavy deprivations and deep trials, even if indeed one is not excommunicated from the Church, losing all spiritual blessings."
-Prophet Spencer W. Kimball, The Miracle of Forgiveness, Page 155
"How like the mistletoe is immorality. The killer plant starts with a sticky sweet berry. Little indiscretions are the berries -- indiscretions like sex thoughts sex discussions, passionate kissing, pornography. The leaves and little twigs are masturbation and necking and such, growing with every exercise. The full-grown plant is petting and sex looseness. It confounds, frustrates, and destroys like the parasite if it is not cut out and destroyed, for, in time it robs the tree, bleeds its life, and leaves it barren and dry; and, strangely enough, the parasite dies with its host."
- Apostle Spencer W. Kimball, General Conference Address, April 1, 1967.
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