The Education Works coalition believes teenagers need honest information to make responsible choices about sex. The Education Works coalition is working to ensure that schools teach sexual health with a medically accurate and balanced approach – teaching abstinence along with facts about contraception and responsible decision-making.

Texas parents want their children to receive age appropriate, medically accurate information about responsible pregnancy and sexually transmitted disease prevention that includes information on abstinence and birth control.

Yet, far too often, Texas schools fail to give young people the complete and accurate information they need to stay healthy, putting Texas teens at risk:

• Texas has the highest rate of births¹ and repeat births to teenagers in the nation.²
• Every 10 minutes a teen in Texas becomes pregnant.³
• Approximately 1 in 4 teen girls has a sexually transmitted disease.⁴
• 60% of mothers who have a child before they turn 18 fail to graduate from high school.⁵

Education Works supports common sense solutions to give teens practical information about health that deals with the real life situations they face everyday:

• Teaching young people that abstinence is the best policy for avoiding pregnancy and disease and giving them the comprehensive information they need to protect themselves from unintended pregnancy and STI’s, including HIV.
• Using effective curricula based upon sound science and unbiased research, not ideology or politics.
• Education that helps young people learn to make healthy decisions, foster communication skills, develop meaningful relationships, and express affection, love and intimacy in ways that are consistent with their family values.
• Education that respects and values young people and helps them become healthy, safe, responsible adults.

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