Planned Parenthood Still Pushes Publicly Funded Sex-Education Despite Past Failures

Sex Education, , ,

Planned Parenthood is still promoting publicly funded sex-education despite the program’s past failures.

On Tuesday the nation’s leading abortion provider posted on X,

Hey state politicians sex ed in schools actually reduces the rate of unplanned pregnancies and STIs!

It’s almost as if giving young people the tools and education they need to make healthy decisions actually helps them make healthy decisions. Wild, right?

The irony is that government evaluations have shown Planned Parenthood’s publicly funded sex-education and family planning strategies simply do not work the way Planned Parenthood claims they do.

Several years ago the Obama Administration gave Planned Parenthood millions of dollars to conduct teen pregnancy prevention programs in the Pacific Northwest.

Afterwards, evaluations of Planned Parenthood’s sex-education program found students who went through it were often more likely to become pregnant or cause a pregnancy.

In other words, Planned Parenthood’s multimillion dollar sex-education program did exactly the opposite of what the federal government wanted.

In the 1980s and 1990s, public officials in Arkansas promoted Planned Parenthood-style sex-education, but the programs failed to have a meaningful impact on teen pregnancy and abortion in Arkansas.

Then in 1997 the Arkansas Legislature and Governor Mike Huckabee began promoting abstinence education in Arkansas. From 1997 to 2005, Arkansas’ teen birthrate decreased 17% — and Arkansas’ teen abortion rate plummeted a staggering 48%.

Governor Huckabee’s abstinence education model was so successful in Arkansas that it drew national recognition.

In 2016 — again, while President Barack Obama was still in office — the federal Centers for Disease Control released a 208-page report concluding teenagers who practice abstinence were healthier in nearly every way than teenagers who are sexually active.

The report looked at everything from seatbelt and bike helmet use to substance abuse, diet, exercise, and even tanning bed use.

The CDC found sexually-active teens were less healthy and engaged in riskier behavior across the board.

The report underscored that not only were abstinence education models like Arkansas’ effective at reducing teen pregnancy and abortion, but they also promoted healthier lifestyle choices across the board.

So while Planned Parenthood continues to promote public funding for its ineffective sex-education programs, Arkansas has shown there are much better ways to reduce teen pregnancy. Handing out tax dollars to abortion providers like Planned Parenthood simply is not the answer.

Articles appearing on this website are written with the aid of Family Council’s researchers and writers.

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Lawsuit Filed to Block Arkansas Law Protecting Students From CRT, Explicit Sexual Material

Legislation,

A federal lawsuit filed Monday would block the State of Arkansas from enforcing a section of the 2023 LEARNS Act protecting public school students from Critical Race Theory and explicit sexual material at school.

Act 237 of 2023 is a comprehensive education law by Sen. Breanne Davis (R – Russellville) and Rep. Keith Brooks (R – Little Rock) titled “The LEARNS Act.”

The law deals with issues such as Critical Race Theory, teacher salaries, public school employment, early childhood care, and protecting elementary school children from inappropriate sexual material at school.

It also provides a blueprint for implementing a voluntary school choice program that would make it possible for students to receive a publicly-funded education at a public or private school or at home.

The federal lawsuit filed Monday specifically challenges Section 16 of the LEARNS Act, which does the following:

  • Section 16 requires the Arkansas Secretary of Education to review all policies to be sure that indoctrination — including critical race theory — is prohibited and that no public school employee or public school student is required to attend training or orientation that is based on Critical Race Theory or other prohibited indoctrination.
  • Section 16 requires each public school to implement a child sex abuse and human trafficking prevention program that is age appropriate and complies with Arkansas Department of Education standards.
  • Section 16 prohibits sexual material in classroom instruction before fifth grade. This includes instruction regarding sexual intercourse, sexual reproduction, sexual orientation, and gender identity.

You can download a copy of Section 16 here.

Under Section 16 of the LEARNS Act, sex education is prohibited in Kindergarten and early elementary school. In later grades, sex education must be conducted according to other state laws—including other Arkansas laws that prohibit explicit, “comprehensive” sex education. Altogether, Section 16 makes significant improvements to Arkansas sex education laws.

The lawsuit focuses on the LEARNS Act’s effect on AP African American Studies at Central High School in Little Rock.

However, the lawsuit asks the federal court to declare Section 16 of the LEARNS Act unconstitutional and block the State of Arkansas from enforcing it.

If a federal court blocked all of Section 16 as the lawsuit requests, that presumably would include the parts of the law protecting public school students from explicit sexual material in the classroom.

You Can Download a Copy of the Lawsuit Here.

Articles appearing on this website are written with the aid of Family Council’s researchers and writers.

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