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Breanna Zumbrunnen
Lisa Packer
English 2010
10 November 2016
Are Abstinence Programs Ineffective?
All children deserve the right to sex education. Sex education should be seen as the right to
knowledge, because the more you know the more you succeed were the first words that came
out of my aunt Loris mouth when I asked her for her opinion on sex education on November 1st
2016
My first question for my aunt Lori when I interviewed her was straight to the point.
What is your opinion on sex education? Lori is like an open book and she tells it how it is. Lori
works for DCFS, (Division of Child and Family Services) her job requires her to interact with
children, their biological families, future adoption families, and foster families. The reason I
chose her to do this profile on Abstinence-only programs is because she is not only a mother
herself, but she is also is able to see the outcome of children who are uneducated on sex
education and preventing teen pregnancy and STDs everyday when she goes to work. I then
began to ask Lori to go into further detail on her statement, she stated:

Children and teens in the foster care system and other children and teens who are
involved with the Division of Child and Family services (DCFS) are more likely to
experience teen pregnancy and STDs because their families, guardians, or other mentors
are experiencing drug addictions, alcohol addiction, mental illness etc. This causes the
children and teens to be and feel neglected. When a child is being neglected they are

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losing their main source of human needs. With this being said, children and teens who
experience this are not thinking about safe sex, in fact thats probably the last thing that is
crossing their mind. This makes them more likely to experience teen pregnancy and
STDs because they are not being taught sex education in the home, and the Utah
education program in schools is based primarily on abstinence with no protection
methods being discussed.

As I interviewed Lori, because she is my aunt, she was willing to be very open. I only
asked her a few questions because these questions went into great detail. After the first question I
asked about her experience as a mother and being a social worker. She answered about all of my
questions in a few moments and was able to provide a very strong opinion against abstinenceonly programs. She believes they are very ineffective. She also describes her thoughts on the
outcome of them. I believe that abstinence-only programs create an increase on teen health
risks. If we dropped the abstinence-only programs and created all schools to teach contraceptive
use, we would see a great decrease in teenage pregnancy.

Lori has used what she has learned from these experiences to raise her children with
proper sex education. I have worked for DCFS for twenty-seven years now, and I learned
quickly in my first few years that these children and teens were suffering from the lack of proper
sex education in their lives. I have five children between the ages of seventeen and twenty-five.
They have all been taught about the risks of unprotected sex and because they have been
properly educated, they have not suffered from any of the risks. Lori seemed very passionate
about this topic, I then asked her if she stands with the statement that abstinence only programs

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are ineffective. I do believe that abstinence only programs are ineffective because teens are
having sex whether we like it or not, so if they are only being taught abstinence they are more
likely to experience teen pregnancy and STDs. This statement by Lori was based on her
opinion, but statistics show that it can be proved. Empirical data shows that abstinence-only
programs are completely ineffective compared to comprehensive sex education.

Figure 2. Source: The Consequences of Abstinence-Only Programs. " The Effective Way to Prevent Unsafe Sex Among Teenagers
Comprehensive Sex Education, 23 Apr.. 2015. Web. 26 Sept. 2016.

Comprehensive sexual education teaches students what they deserve to know as well as
provide them with more factual information and better insight on their personal health. Rates of

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teen pregnancy are higher in the U.S. than in other developed countries. (U.S. Department of
Health, 1) This quote in a research paper titled Trends in Teen Pregnancy and Childbearing has
been used several times in the research I have found on teen pregnancy rates.
My last question for Lori was that if she had to go back to high school and the sex
education program for herself what would she change? She stated I also grew up in and
attended the the same high school as my children did. The Sex education program was the same
for me as it is for the students sitting in those classrooms today. Lucky enough for me I had
parents who taught me the importance of contraceptive use and birth control, but not everyone is
that lucky. I would change the entire education program to be based on contraceptive use if I had
the power to. As I finished the interview with my aunt, I saw a whole entire new side of her that
I never have seen before. The passion in her eyes as she spoke on this topic truly inspired me and
made me think about my own experience with abstinence-only education and what I think my
future children should have the right to be taught in schools.

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Work Cited
Stranger-Hall, Kathrin F., and David W. Hall. Abstinence-Only Education and Teen
Pregnancy Rates: Why We Need Comprehensive Sex Education in the U.S. Plus ONE
6.10 (2011): 1-11. Academic Search Premier. Web. 24 Sept. 2016.
Comprehensive Sex Education: Research and Results. Advocates for Youth ,1 Sept
2009. Web. 24 Sept. 2016.
Essert, Matt. The States with the Highest Teenage Birth Rates Have One Thing in
Common. Mic. 15 Sept. 2014. Web. 24 Sept. 2016.
Alford, Sue. Abstinence Only Until Marriage Programs Abstinence Only Ineffective,
Unethical, and Poor Public Health. 23 April 2007. Web. 24 Sept. 2016.
N.A. Trends in Teen Pregnancy and Childbearing U.S Department of Health and
Human Service. 02 June 2016. Web. 24 Sept. 2016.
Doom, Urial. Is Abstinence-only Education Better than a Comprehensive Sex Education
Solution? Sex Education Debate. 15 April 2016. Web. 24 Sept. 2016.
Summers, Todd. The Consequences of Abstinence-Only Programs Comprehensive Sex
Education. 10 July 2016. Web. 24 Sept. 2016.

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