The importance of sex education among the youth

The youth of today is faced with modernization and it has brought a lot of negative consequences in their lives. A good “sex education” is needed so that the youth can gather their acts together.

Sexual risk taking behavior has increased in the past decades and this has brought an increase in unwanted pregnancies, sexually transmitted diseases (STDs) and abortions among others. Why are these behaviors bad, you may ask? Simply because it can ruin and risk their lives if they are suddenly become pregnant and their bodies are still young, it might cause maternal mortality too, and they might get STDs if they are having unprotected sex and multiple sex partners. Early pregnancy too can affect their future as they need to stop going to school. A good “sex education” is the solution to these problems. My interest in this issue is borne by the concern about the future of the youth.

According to the Advocates of Youth as many as 529,000 women die each year from complications of pregnancy and childbirth. Pregnancy is the leading cause of death for young women ages 15 through 19.

• A good “sex education” can serve a s a guide for the youth. We saw in the news as documented by CNN (December 2, 2009) that there is rise in “sexting”. Sexting is the exchanges of visual and sexual images through the use of cell phones. The youth are more into risky sexual behavior now more than ever. The family as a basic institution is challenged to face the consequences of such behaviors in the life of the youth.

However the family as an institution needs the education sector to help them out with the problems of the youth for the simple reason that the youth spends so much time in the school and it has a great influence in their lives. Education is still the second institution in charge of nurturing them. A good “sex education” should be in placed.

They must implement or include a curriculum review to include a good “sex education” topic which includes the overall package of:

• Inculcating the value of self worth among its student so that they have a high regard of themselves and so they can have self confidence and say no to sexual predators and to those who lure them.
• They should have a sense of moral values to know the value of life itself
• They should have “sex education” which include not only knowing the anatomy of body parts but how to take care and protect themselves, and other issues regarding personal hygiene
• The importance of knowing the consequences of physically abusing themselves and engaging in sexual risky behaviors should be part of the curriculum too, like early pregnancy, they might die if they give birth and are still young, and the consequences of having babies, as they are still baby themselves. Not necessarily how to use protection as this might have the wrong idea to have sex as long as you use contraception but at least they know that they have options. Now this is a controversial topic, so parents should be involved as well to help to come up with agreeable topics to include in the curriculum.
• Consultation with parents is a good idea to come up with a better idea on how to come up with a subject matter agreeable to both the parents and school officials. This can be included in the subject social studies or physical education subjects.
• Stakeholders such as the advertisers federation, parents, youth representatives, government agencies and the education sector should have a regular meeting to at least come up with monitoring and evaluation guidelines whether programs or subjects are properly implemented.
• The new curriculum should cover basic values such as respect to human beings to avoid prejudiced (as in the case of beatings because the other students are gay (this was featured in CNN the same date as above) must be included too. This will avoid on and off campus violence among the youth. This should be included as the subject matter in sex education, respect for every human beings sexual orientation.
• The government can have a share too in this endeavor by shelling out money out of the taxes from the parents of these youth. Instead of investing in other areas, they should invest in the youth, because they are still the future of the motherland.

Thank you for the read. And we should all make sex education among the youth a concern for everyone.