State News
Colorado: School Seeks Waiver for State Sex Ed
Liberty Common School in Ft. Collins has applied for a waiver to Colorado's new sex-ed law. The waiver needs to be approved by Colorado's State Board of Education and would allow the school flexibility and choice rather than abiding by the mandate of the new Sex Ed law. Currently nine charter schools in the state have sex-ed waivers, but this is the first application that will be considered after passage of the state's new sex-ed law. If the State Board grants Liberty Common a waiver, the school can then teach students based upon its proposed in its replacement plan.
Illinois: Sex Ed to Include Consent
With the passage of HB3550, sex education in Illinois schools will now include a mandatory discussion on consent. Gov. J.B. Pritzker signed into law the new bill which requires teaching kids in grades 6 through 12 consent from numerous angles. The law goes into effect January 2020.
Texas: Back to the Drawing Board
Austin Intermediate School District was set to use Planned Parenthood-backed guidelines for middle and high school sex ed lessons, but the passage of Senate Bill 22 prohibited them from doing so. The goal is to get the official plans approved by the board by October, but parents are concerned about the district's transparency, when it comes to making the lessons plans available for examination prior to board approval in October.
Resources
HIV Prevalence Among Youth
Did you know that 1 in 5 of all new HIV diagnoses are among youth aged 13-24? There's also a significant disparity by gender and race. This resource from the CDC gives a visual picture of these statistics and continues to underscore the importance of the SRA message for young people.
Hepatitis: Sorting Through the Facts
Hepatitis A, B, and C are liver infections caused by three different viruses. Although each can cause similar symptoms, they are spread in different ways and can affect the liver differently. A breakdown of symptoms, causes, number of U.S. cases, key facts, and other important information can be found here.
The Link Between HPV and Cancer
Each year, about 44,000 new cases of cancer are found in parts of the body where human papillomavirus (HPV) is often found. HPV causes about 34,800 of these cancers. While there is no way to know which people who have HPV will develop cancer, more than 9 of every 10 cases of cervical cancer are caused by HPV, and 91% of anal cancers are thought to be caused by the same virus.
Opportunities
Bright Healthy Relationships Initiative Seeks SRA Program Coordinator
BRIGHT is celebrating 15 years of presenting to teens in the greater Louisville area. Our BRIGHT instructors encourage teens to pursue healthy relationships and set a goal of sexual risk avoidance. Last year, BRIGHT reached over 4,100 students in 42 local middle and high schools and continues to grow its reach each year.
BRIGHT is seeking a motivated individual with a passion for this message to lead this program forward. The BRIGHT Coordinator manages curriculum development, training, marketing, & scheduling. The position may also include instructional time in the classroom. Ideal candidates will have strong organizational, leadership and administrative skills. A bachelor's degree is preferred. Please send inquiries to admin@brightlou.org.
Parent Corner
Teens and Social Media: How Do Young People Feel About it?
Depression, anxiety, unhappiness, all of these adjectives can be used to describe a steadily increasing number of today's teens. Surveys, debates, studies and research all point to the widespread use of tech as one of the possible causes of unhappy teens, but no research has been able to definitively support these claims. What we do know is that technology is changing every aspect of life for the "post-internet" generation. But how do teens see it? According to the Pew Research Center, only 31% of teens see social media as a positive thing, 24% see it as mostly negative and 45% are somewhere in between. More than half of all the young people surveyed said they spend too much time on their phones with 41% saying they spend too much time on social media.
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