The lower level of Rock Bridge High School barely gets cell phone service, but that doesn’t stop the students from trying. Their faces are in their phones until the moment they rush into Greg Nagel’s classroom. It’s a space filled with colorful posters, rows of desks and a CPR dummy. One poster reads, “Her life was boring, she thought she needed a change. Teen pregnancy: consider all the angles.” It hangs on a chalkboard above a row of freshman girls, all of whom are wearing some variation of an unspoken uniform: Nike shorts, a T-shirt and either running shoes, Chacos or Birkenstocks.
Nagel has taught health at Rock Bridge for four years. Right now, the students are working on group presentations about the cost of health care. In a few weeks, it will be time for healthy relationships and human sexuality. The human sexuality unit is three weeks long and covers issues such as anatomy, sexually transmitted infections and birth control options.
Nagel says he’s careful about how this information is presented because he doesn’t want parents to feel uncomfortable. He says some parents are surprised that health and sexual education are being taught to freshmen, who are generally 14 and 15 years old. Parents have the option to contact Nagel and request that their student not participate in group lectures and instead review the material on their own. Information on sexual health can also be sent home so parents can review it with their students. The class syllabus states that parents should, “take time with your child to share your values, your beliefs and your expectations about this sensitive topic.”
Rock Bridge brings in guest speakers for many health units such as drugs and alcohol prevention and healthy relationships. But Nagel says the human sexuality unit comes with no demos and is mostly handouts about how birth control options work. Nagel says the information is good, but there is a lack of higher level content. Nagel has a question box placed on the main desk in the health room where students can anonymously ask questions concerning the human sexuality unit. “Our take-home message is abstinence; absolutely, it’s abstinence,” Nagel says.
MU student Natalie Heath attended West Junior High School, where she took health and sexual education. She graduated from Hickman High School in 2013. Heath remembers discussing pregnancy and ovulation, STIs and women’s menstruation cycles in sexual education.
Heath says she believes her education was lacking, and the curriculum implied that safe sex was the woman’s responsibility. She doesn’t remember much talk of birth control options and says there wasn’t information provided about women’s resources, such as the Planned Parenthood clinic in Columbia.
“I think it would have been helpful to talk about other things such as endometriosis and other women’s health issues,” Heath says. “Just because women have uteruses doesn’t mean they always work right, and it’s important to talk about that.”
Although some students say there isn’t enough discussion during these courses, others believe there’s too much. A mother of a freshman student at Battle High School, who asked not to be named because she is involved with the school, was uncomfortable with the conversations that arose in a health and education course because it wasn’t tailored to each student.
She says that even though she is open with her children about their bodies, she felt the course was more in-depth than she expected. “From a district-wide standpoint, I know they are doing what they need to do,” she says. “But personally, I am more conservative than the district is.”
Nagel’s classroom contains rows of desks, a CPR dummy and a poster that warns his students about teen pregnancy.
She says she believes every child is different and says what is appropriate for one child is not appropriate for another. When discussing the class with her son, she says he didn’t understand the severity of the issues. “There is no encouragement to wait (to have sex), and I don’t know if the kids fully understand the consequences of their actions,” she says. “We are already seeing with our younger son that he can tell our values are different than the school district’s.” She says that the health and sexual education courses are given at a good age, but it’s important for parents to stay involved and be aware of what’s being discussed.
According to the Missouri General Assembly, all human sexuality education must be medically and factually accurate. This applies to all Missouri public schools. The statute was last updated in August 2016 and includes policies such as “… discussion of the possible emotional and psychological consequences of preadolescent and adolescent sexual activity and the consequences of adolescent pregnancy, as well as the advantages of (giving children up for) adoption.” It also says course materials or instruction about human sexuality are not allowed by any person or entity providing abortion services. This means health care providers such as Planned Parenthood are not allowed in schools.