Campaign for Comprehensive Sex Education for Our Kids

Choosing a Campaign Issue

Planning a Campaign Strategy

Getting the Word Out and Building Support

Learning How to Use the Media for Our Campaign

Making an Impact

Campaign for Comprehensive Sex Education for Our Kids

In 2007 we launched our first campaign, and had important victories. After a successful recruitment process, a group of women joined the Center’s Steering Committee. Since that time, members of the Steering Committee have met on a weekly basis and participated in day-long trainings and strategy sessions quarterly. The following is a history of the first year of our on-going campaign for comprehensive sex education in schools.

In order to make the best use of the limited time and resources available to the group, we decided to focus on one issue. We spent three months investigating the possibilities. At a brainstorming session, three potential issues were identified:

• Safeguard informed consent for HIV testing.
• Support and expand research for microbicides: An HIV prevention method controlled by women.
• Comprehensive sex education in public schools.

We learned how to do research on the internet, and broke up into three working groups to gather information on each of these topics. Each working group made a presentation of their findings. The group assessed each possible issue with a series of strategic questions: What is the level of interest in the community? Who will benefit? Is there a clear target and timeframe? How important is it to win on the issue? After much debate and discussion, the group decided to take on the issue comprehensive sex education.

“The most troubling aspect of HIV is not only the alarming rate of infection among our youth, but also the fact that it is preventable. Knowledge is power! Providing comprehensive, age appropriate sex education gives our youth a more leveled playing field than abstinence-only programs. These programs are limited in their views and do not provide the information necessary to make healthy and informed choices.” Patricia

Having chosen an issue, we set specific goals and planned a path to reach these goals. We learned how to build a base of support for our campaign, and to work in coalition with other allies to build power. We developed a two-prong strategy to work at the state and local levels, having identified a target at each level who has the power to change policy and provide funding for sex education. We joined the efforts of a state-wide coalition to create funding for sex education programs in New York State. We also joined forces with a city-wide alliance working to bring comprehensive sex education into New York City schools.

Armed with information and skills, we kicked the campaign into high gear and got out into our communities to generate support. We visited churches, community centers, health fairs, and other public events to collect over 500 signed postcards to educate the State Senate Majority Leader Joseph Bruno on the importance of sex education. We contacted over 6o AIDS organizations to sign-on to a position letter. We then hand-delivered these support materials to Senator Bruno’s office in Albany and met with his staff to share with them our views, as HIV-positive women of color, on the importance of sex education. On the city level, we collected additional postcards addressed to Mayor Bloomberg. We issued an email action alert to all the people who had signed the postcards, urging them to call the City’s information line to request comprehensive sex education in city schools.

In addition to these grassroots strategies, we became educated in media skills to get our message out further. At a day-long training, we came up with frames and messages to communicate the need for sex education from our unique point of view. We expanded our skills at a spokesperson training, and then prepared personal testimonials, and wrote Opinion-Editorials and press releases.

Two encouraging victories were announced in the Fall of 2007. Governor Spitzer’s administration announced that New York State will refuse federal funding for abstinence-only-until-marriage programs, and will redirect state funding previously earmarked for these programs toward comprehensive sex education. In New York City, the Chancellor of the Department of Education announced the appointment of a new Director of Health and Fitness, as well as a new sex education curriculum for the city school system. While these victories may fall short of our campaign goals, we are nonetheless encouraged by these positive developments toward expanding comprehensive sex education. Further, we are already building on the work of our first local campaign to take our fight for comprehensive sex education to the national level, as we continue our work to ensure comprehensive sex education is taught in all our schools.