An email worth reading was sent to New Hampshire’s Executive Councilors regarding their vote to reject taxpayer funding for the Get Real sex education program for NH students.
Three out of five voted to reject the funding:
9 December 2022
Members of the New Hampshire Executive Council
By Email, with attachments
joseph.D.Kenney@nh.gov
cinde.Warmington@nh.gov
janet.L.Stevens@nh.gov
ted.Gatsas@nh.gov
David.K.Wheeler@nh.gov
Dear Ladies and Gentlemen:
I write to thank you for refusing to proceed with funding for the Get Real sex education program. I also offer background information to support your decision and encourage the Council to seek alternate course providers.
While the Get Real program may previously have been funded in NH for some period, the premise upon which it was developed and purported standards for its materials (present medically accurate education about healthy sexual behaviour) changed radically in 2019 to one of explicit progressive sexual education advocacy. Get Real references the organization SIECUS for the frameworks it says it aligns with. That organization’s stated purpose is to “spark large-scale social change.”
SIECUS also (1) asserts that “Sex Ed sits at the nexus of many social justice movements – from LBGTQ rights and reproductive Justice….” The motto for the Get Real publisher (ETR) is “advancing health equity.” That purpose is decidedly different to educating young children (middle school age) and informing young adults (high school age) about biology and healthy sex behaviour. What is the social change they want to effect? I doubt parents of prospective students know of this focus for the program, nor the single viewpoint of the authors and presenters. Does the Executive Council want to endorse these objectives? ( 1 https://siecus.org/about-siecus/our-history/)
The program’s authors assert that the program is shown to delay sex among participating middle school students; empower parents as primary educators about sex; and reinforce communication within families. However, the studies relied on to support these broad claims are based on entirely subjective surveys of approximately 500 school-age participants in the Boston area. As with much social science analysis, there is no way to confirm the purported results nor to replicate them. Further, the surveys addressed vaginal sex only and were administered during a period (2005-2008) when children in the US were generally found to be exploring other behaviours less likely to result in pregnancy – oral and anal sex in particular, and increasingly homosexual and bisexual activity. It was also a period when sexually transmitted diseases increased in the US. All of these shifts have affected girls disproportionately.
The program says it seeks to highlight the role of parents in their children’s care but also asserts that the materials and activities used by participants will be private within the classroom. That seems intended to assure children that no one will be told anything about conversations or disclosures the child makes in the class. Parents certainly have reason to expect that all activities their children participate in with other adults will be open and disclosed to them, but that may not be the case. However, depending on the teacher’s personal beliefs or school policy, parental rights could be ignored completely.
The program’s developers, presenters, and trainers have substantial ties to Planned Parenthood. That organization’s primary profit-making activity is providing abortions. Increasingly it characterizes as educational and advocates for pornography in school libraries. It also assists in making available permanent changes to children’s bodies through sex change surgery and medications such as chemical castration packaged as puberty “blockers.”
The foundation for Get Real and other newly promoted sex education courses is from SIECUS – Sex Ed for Social Change, formerly known as Sexuality Information and Education Council of the United States. It was formed as a not-for-profit organization by a senior executive of Planned Parenthood, reflecting the specific intentions and practices of that organization. It is not a governmental agency, although it has presented itself (and apparently been widely accepted) as the sole authority on sex education in this country for decades. It’s now focused on advocacy surrounding sexual practices and expanding acceptance of homosexual and non-binary behaviours, particularly at younger ages. (The results of that advocacy show up in news reports almost weekly with adults parading online the ways they present sexual matters (their own and that of their friends) in their primary classrooms.) SIECUS also contributes to the publication of the so-called National Sex Education Standards. These Standards are followed by schools throughout the country and now assert without irony that a child’s gender is “assigned” at birth by a medical professional. (This apparently makes the x and y chromosomes the only ones biologists should ignore.)
The Standards document also widely expands the concepts of sex education to include class, climate, law enforcement bias, privilege, race and culture, and other non-medical concepts. Those are ideological and highly politicized concepts that no one discloses to parents when seeking consent to classes. They are certainly not appropriate for middle school and early high school-aged children.
Information about SIECUS and ETR is readily available online, but I attach PDF files of the Guidelines and the Standards that present in detail the outlook for the Get Real program. It is a politicized and ideological program very much focused on effecting social change by influencing children’s behaviour, in large part by encouraging sexual experimentation at earlier ages and secretive relationships with non-family adults. It dismisses any recognition of parental rights. Is that the outcome you want? I urge you to seek other viewpoint-neutral materials for any taxpayer-funded sex ed program.
Sincerely yours,
Diane Dunning Martin
PDF email Attachments :
National Sex Education Standards –
Guidelines for Comprehensive Sexuality Education -3rd edition