CAN OUR YOUNG PEOPLE REALLY ABSTAIN?

Greetings,

This past year President Obama cut all funding for abstinence-only programs. He said there was NOT enough scientific evidence. Well, we now have evidence. I new study was recently published in the Archives of Pediatric & Adolescent Medicine. This was federally funded research done by John B. Jemmott III, a professor at the University of Pennsylvania. The study focused on African American students from four public middle schools from 2001 to 2004.


The Students were divided into 4 groups.

1. The students were taught by a ‘safe-sex’ curriculum teaching the students about condoms and other contraceptives.

2. The students received an ‘abstinence-only’ education teaching that the students should not have sex untl marriage and were give the reasons why.

3. The students were given a comprehensive curriculum including safe sex and abstinence elements.

4. The students were given a ‘healthy living’ curriculum such as advise on eating and exercise. This did not include sex education.

The first group, which received the safe-sex curriculum, did the worst. 52% of the students started having sex. The BEST results came from the ‘abstinence-only’ group which had a much lower rate of 33% having sex. The Blended program had 42%, and the healthy living curriculum had 47%. Please notice that the last group received no sex education and they still did better than the ‘safe-sex’ group.

This was just a small group of schools used to get scientific evidence. Just imagine how effective abstinence-only programs would be if they became part of the culture. I really believe that our young people can really do great things. But it is important that we, as adults, expect them to do really great things. If we don’t expect much, we won’t get much.

peace