The California Healthy Youth Act (CHYA), adopted in January 2016, outlines the requirements for sexual health education in public schools. Key points include:

• Sexual health education is required twice during a student’s educational career: once in middle school and again in high school.

• Sexual health education provided in any grade (including puberty education) must be medically accurate and age-appropriate. Materials must be appropriate for students of all races, genders, sexual orientations, ethnic and cultural backgrounds, pupils with disabilities, and English learners. All instruction must:

  • Affirmatively recognize people have different orientation and include examples

  • Teach about gender, gender expression, gender identity and the harm of negative stereotypes

  • Encourage communication with parents/guardians/ trusted adults

  • Teach about healthy relationships

  • Teach about decision making, negotiation and refusal skills

  • Teach the value of and prepare pupils to have and maintain committed relationships, such as marriage

• Parents must be notified that their child will have sexual health education at the beginning of the school year or at least 14 days before classes start and be allowed to see the materials before classes start. If a parent does not want their child to take the class, they must make a written request excusing their child from instruction.

• Schools can elect to offer sex education earlier than grade 7, in which case they must adhere to the same requirements. No program may “promote or teach religious doctrine,” instruction must encourage parent-child communication about sexuality, and instruction must “provide information about the effectiveness and safety of all Food and Drug Administration (FDA)-approved contraceptive methods in preventing pregnancy, including, but not limited to, emergency contraception.” Parents or guardians may remove their children from sex education and/or sexually transmitted infection (STI)/HIV education classes.

• Starting in 7th grade, the curriculum must cover abstinence, effectiveness, and safety of contraception, protection from sexually transmitted diseases, and decision-making. Schools must use trusted sources of information, like the American Academy of Pediatrics, to determine medical accuracy. All pregnancy and STI prevention devices approved by the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) must be covered.

• Schools cannot provide abstinence-only programs. Abstinence-only education presents abstinence as the only option for preventing pregnancy or sexually transmitted diseases; the law requires that other methods be included. Many abstinence-only programs are religious in nature; sex education cannot promote any religious ideas.Teachers of both HIV/AIDS education and sexual health education must be trained in the subject. Schools may use outside organizations or speakers provided they have the requisite training, but those organizations must also follow the law when they present.

AMAZE.org is an initiative that provides comprehensive, age-appropriate, and medically-accurate sexual health videos for adolescents ages 10-14, along with resources for educators and parents. As of July 2020 our videos have received over 40 million views on our YouTube channel since AMAZE.org was launched in September of 2016. AMAZE videos have been translated/adapted in more than 23 countries.

VISION:

AMAZE envisions a world that recognizes child and adolescent sexual development as natural and healthy, a world in which young people everywhere are supported and affirmed and the adults in their lives communicate openly and honestly with them about puberty, reproduction, relationships, sex and sexuality. In such a world, young people across the globe would have access to the information and support they need to develop into sexually healthy adults.

MISSION: 

AMAZE harnesses the power of digital media to provide young adolescents around the globe with medically accurate, age-appropriate, affirming, and honest sex education they can access directly online—regardless of where they live or what school they attend.

AMAZE also strives to assist adults—parents, guardians, educators and health care providers around the globe—to communicate effectively and honestly about sex and sexuality with the children and adolescents in their lives.

APPROACH:

AMAZE leverages the expertise of master sexuality educators, the creativity of animation professionals, the input of young people, and the power of the internet to create and market:

• Engaging, educational, age-appropriate, often humorous sex education videos for young adults.

• Educational resources, including short videos, to build the skills of parents and guardians to better communicate with their children about sex and sexuality.

• Toolkits, lesson plans, promotional materials and other resources to help educators and health care providers refer students and young patients to AMAZE as an available, free and fun resource to learn about sex and sexuality.

NO-COST, HONEST, AGE-APPROPRIATE CONTENT

Thirty-five years of public health research clearly demonstrates that young people who receive honest, age-appropriate, non-judgmental information about puberty, relationships and sexual health are more likely to delay sexual initiation when they are young and to use condoms and other contraceptive methods when they do become sexually active. Further, quality sex education can help young people successfully navigate puberty, learn about healthy body image, distinguish between healthy and unhealthy relationships, and understand the concepts of consent and mutual respect. For more information about the power of providing youth with quality sex education check out the links below.

AMAZE is a free resource to help you talk to your kids about everything from babies to bodies to gender to consent to relationships. Per the AMAZE website: 

"You know that talking with your kids about sex and growing up is important, but it’s tempting to put it off. The reality is that these conversations can’t wait. AMAZE videos are here to help you break the ice and start these critical conversations so that your kids get the accurate information they need."

Check out the AMAZE Video Topics. Each link brings you directly to more parent information for that video, such as conversation starters, related videos, books and websites you can use. Click on our new Having the Talks feature to see videos by educators about having the talks!

To help you as a parent, they have also created My Amaze. Use it to share specific videos or groups of videos with your children on a protected page, so you get to curate the videos your child sees, without your child having access to the rest of the AMAZE website. After registration, come back anytime and login to view your personalized page. See whether each video has been watched, edit your video list, share content or add new content.

AMAZE strives to be the go-to resource for information on topics related to a young person’s growth and development.

All videos go through a thorough review process by AMAZE staff, AMAZE’s International Content Review Committee, and other subject matter experts and partners. AMAZE staff and International Content Committee are individuals who have experience in public health, educational theory, adolescent development, age and developmentally-appropriate sex education and health education. All content is aligned with the National Sex Education Standards and International Technical Guidance on Sexuality Education.

AMAZE understands that all young people develop at various ages throughout their adolescence. AMAZE believes that regardless of where a young person lives or goes to school, all young people need access to this information so they can make informed decisions to safeguard their health and well-being now and into the future.

AMAZE supports and empowers parents, caregivers, educators, and other trusted adults with the autonomy to view and select videos that they deem appropriate for their young person’s personal growth and development. For additional resources on how to utilize AMAZE videos with young people, visit AMAZE Educators and AMAZE Parents for playlists, lesson plans, toolkits, or look for the school bus icon that are classroom favorites. For more information on what ages to start talking to a young person about sexuality, check out the resource guide from Talking with Your Kids.

The AMAZE team includes experts in sexuality education, youth sexual development and parent-child communication that work with animators to develop each video. Video topics are designed to meet the learning objectives outlined in the National Sexuality Education Standards. These Standards first published in the Journal of Adolescent Health in 2011, provide guidance to schools regarding the information and skills students need to learn in each grade level, kindergarten through 12th grade.

To supplement this list, the AMAZE team is in regular contact with classroom educators, parents and members of its youth advisory board to explore new topics to tackle. Finally, viewers engaged on AMAZE’s YouTube channel often request video topics that resonate with them and their peers. The AMAZE team strives to prioritize requests from these viewers. If you have a topic you’d like us to cover, contact AMAZE At info@amaze.org.