Massachusetts on Thursday took a big step toward becoming only the 11th state to require that sex education taught in public high schools contain “medically accurate” information. While just 24 of the 50 states require that sex ed be part of a school curriculum, only 10 currently mandate that that “education” actually contain accurate medical facts, according to the education-news site The 74 Million.
But in a 33-2 vote this week, the Massachusetts State Senate passed an overhaul of the Commonwealth’s school sex ed program that would finally require that teens receive medically accurate information in the school programs, according to Boston University’s WBUR radio.
"If we do not teach this in our schools, our kids still learn about this in an inaccurate way," said Sal DiDomenico, the Democratic state senator who was lead sponsor on the bill. "They're learning from their friends, from their peers, and learning information that is not accurate and could be dangerous for their health."
The Massachusetts Senate contains only four Republicans, two of whom cast the only votes against the sex education bill.
The bill, dubbed “The Healthy Youth Act," would require that schools teach “reproduction and sexual development, how to discuss safe sexual activity, human development changes, anatomy, the benefits of abstinence and importance of contraceptives, healthy relationship and communication skills and more,” according to the WBUR report.
The bill must now go to the Massachsuetts House of Representatives, which is also overwhelmingly Democratic, with 127 Dems to 32 Republicans, and one independent. But the House has nonetheless been more reluctant to pass the sex education reforms, letting similar bills simply die without a vote in 2015 and 2017.
But this latest, 2020 version of the bill has already signed up 97 co-sponsors in the House, up from 70 in 2017. Assuming all 97 stay the course and vote for the legislation, the bill has the votes to pass the House—though Speaker Robert DeLeo has not committed to allowing a vote on the bill, saying only that the sex ed legislation is “on our radar.”
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