At a glance
- A quality sexual health education curriculum includes medically accurate, developmentally appropriate.
- Content should focus on key behavioral outcomes and promote healthy sexual development.
- Quality curriculum gives students the skills and confidence they need to navigate healthy sexual development and avoid or reduce sexual risk behaviors or experiences.
Overview
Quality sexual health education (SHE) helps students in two ways:
- Students will develop skills and knowledge to help navigate sexual development.
- They will gain knowledge to avoid or reduce sexual behaviors that increase risk for sexually transmitted infections (STIs), HIV, and pregnancy.
Sexual health curriculum across grades K–12 should include medically accurate and developmentally appropriate.
Quality sexual health education programs have many things in common, in that they:
- Are taught by well-qualified and highly trained teachers and school staff.
- Address the health needs of all students. This includes students of different sexual orientations, racial and ethnic groups, and intellectual and developmental abilities.
- Connect students to sexual health and other health services at school or in the community.
- Engage parents, caregivers, family, and community partners in school programs.
- Foster positive relationships between children/adolescents and important adults in their lives.
How schools deliver sexual health education
A quality school health education program helps youth develop skills and knowledge to promote healthy sexuality. The curriculum should also address protective behaviors, aimed at reducing or avoiding sexual risks. It is important that sexual health education promote and support skill development.
Give students time to practice and reflect on skills taught. This helps move them toward independence, critical thinking, and problem-solving to avoid or reduce STIs, HIV, pregnancy, and other health issues.
Quality sexual health education programs teach students how to:
- Analyze family, peer, and media influences that effect health.
- Access valid and reliable health information, products, and services (such as STI/HIV testing and treatment).
- Communicate with family, peers, and teachers about issues that affect health.
- Make informed and thoughtful decisions about their health.
- Use goal-setting to support their health.
- Advocate to promote their health and the health of others.
Benefits of delivering sexual health education to students
Promoting and implementing well-designed sexual health education positively effects student health in a variety of ways. Students who participate in these programs are more likely to:
- Delay initiation of sexual intercourse.
- Have fewer sex partners.
- Have fewer experiences of unprotected sex.
- Increase their use of protection, specifically condoms.
- Improve their academic performance.
But education does more than provide skills and knowledge to address sexual behavior.
Quality sexual health education can also include information on substance use, suicide prevention, and how to keep students from committing or being victims of violence. All of these issues place youth at risk for poor physical and mental health, and poor academic outcomes.
Sexual health education in action
Quality sexual health education programs need supportive state and local policies, dedicated instructional time, trained staff, and engaged parents and communities.
Schools can use these four guidelines to support sexual health education:
- Have policies that foster supportive environments for sexual health education.
- Use content that is medically accurate and developmentally appropriate.
- Give staff the knowledge and skills needed to deliver quality sexual health education.
- Engage parents and community partners.