Sex Education Not Inclusive
By: Destiny Bruce
Making health classes more inclusive for students of the LGBTQ+ Community so everyone is safe.
"Teaching Sex Ed for LGBT students is just as important as teaching it for the heterosexual students because it affects everyone."
-Ms.Bartkus & Ms.Jones
Coming Out
A girl who has just began her first year of high school sits in the back of her health class listening to her teacher's lesson. They were learning about safe sex. Though the subject made her uncomfortable, it made her more uncomfortable when she realized it was only male and female intercourse. Students weren't comfortable outing themselves about their sexuality, so no one spoke up when many of us had the same question: What if i'm different? Every year hundreds of kids in Philadelphia catch an STD because of the lack of knowledge. Many health teachers are under-qualified and inexperienced when teaching LGBTQ+ students about their sexual health leading some to look in the wrong places desperate for answers.
"Stigma around LGBTQ+ issues promotes fear, ignorance, and stereotypes, which keeps school administration from wanting to offer LGBTQ+ inclusive sexual health education."
-Jessica Cooper
Working together
I spoke with Jessica Cooper; a Care Coordinator at the Mazzoni Center Family and Community Medicine about this issue. She brought up the idea that "stigma around LGBTQ+ issues promotes fear, ignorance, and stereotypes, which keeps school administration from wanting to offer LGBTQ+ inclusive sexual health education". When teachers are turning their backs on the thought of teaching anything related to LGBTQ students, it neglects a group of students. When someone is ignored within curriculum , it makes them question their quality of being. This could lead to mental health issues and leaves students uneducated about themselves and their health needs. It all starts in the classroom.
One step at a time
Though our school is one of the most LGBTQ+ supportive schools in Philadelphia, we could still use some improvements. For as long as I've been in Carver High School (4 years), the gender neutral bathroom has been out of order. Working together to get that bathroom back in order can help the kids who don't want to feel like an outcast. As stated in the Student Handbook our school "aims to provide a healthy, safe, and positive learning environment for all students", and the gender neutral bathroom would be our first big step forward.
Individually we are one drop, together we are an ocean
Making sure the health of LGBTQ+ kids is well, is not just for their benefit. When one person is in bad health, we are all put in danger. Working together to make sure that we are all in good being can make life easier for all of us. Some may think this doesn´t affect them at all. We are all people, no matter how different we may look to each other so eventually the bad health may reach us and it's our choice to stop it from doing so.
