WaPo Story on Montgomery County Sex-Ed Curriculum

This is an interesting story given the lengthy exchange I had with a commenter on the Montgomery County Public School sex-ed curriculum. Anonymous assured me that the judge disposing of this case had been confused and that all the clearly anti-Baptist, theologically revisionist material cited in the judges opinion was always just teacher resource material, never intended to be used in the classroom. This story supports Anonymous's contention. Committee Reassesses Sex-Ed Decisions:

"Rather, the program was undone by a packet of teacher resource materials that few on the committee thought would draw notice or objections and that students would not likely see.

But members of two groups that opposed changes in the course ... saw big problems with the supporting materials. They feared that the viewpoints expressed in the pieces -- articles that in some cases singled out religious denominations less tolerant of homosexuality, such as Baptists -- inevitably would slip into the classroom. A federal judge agreed.

'The Court does not understand why it is necessary, in attempting to achieve the goals of advocating tolerance and providing health-related information, Defendants must offer up their opinion on such controversial topics as whether homosexuality is a sin, whether AIDS is God's judgment on homosexuality and whether churches that condemn homosexuality are on theologically solid ground,' wrote Judge Alexander Williams Jr. in granting the groups' request for a temporary restraining order to prevent school officials from launching the new curriculum in six schools.

Montgomery County school officials, citing ongoing litigation, have declined to discuss anything related to the sex education curriculum, including the process by which the committee selected the teacher resource materials.

But members of the Citizens' Advisory Committee on Family Life and Human Development have offered their accounts.

Fishback said committee members had not anticipated problems with the resource materials because the documents were for teacher reference and were not likely to be distributed to students.

In January 2004, committee members approved the teacher resource materials for eighth grade on a vote of 13 to 1, with five abstentions. That May, teacher resource materials for 10th grade were recommended on a vote of 10 to 4, with three abstentions."

However, this still raises several questions:

1) Why did the committee think it so important to propagate such vehemently anti-conservative-Christian propaganda among teachers? Even if the resources were meant only for the teachers, it is extremely one-sided, it spreads theological revisionism of the worst kind, slurs the Baptist denomination and endorses other gay-friendly denominations by name, and bases fact/myth comparisons on gay and lesbian advocacy materials. According to this story, the committee voted explicity on the teacher resource material. Apparently this is the material the committee wanted the teachers to use. My Anonymous commenter suggested that it was to expose teachers to materials on this very complex subject, but, again if that were the goal wouldn't the committee have included materials that disputed these anti-Christian claims?

2) What would teachers draw on for actual in-classroom use if not the teacher resource material overwhelmingly endorsed by the committee -- especially when the teacher resource material was clearly selected to achieve the explicit instructional objectives of the curriculum? Among the teacher resource materials was a link to lesson plans. They included handout materials and suggested discussion starters. The supposedly more innocuous curriculum itself is merely an outline. It is not credible to think the teacher charged with examining the influence of religious beliefs on generalizations and stereotypes of homosexuals would not make use of the teacher resources addressing these very issues. It is not credible to think that the teacher charged with examining myths versus facts about homosexuality would ignore the myths versus facts handouts included among the teacher resource materials.

3) What research did this committee do to select these teacher resource materials? They seemed quick to reject ex-gay material as unscientific, yet endorsed as authoritative blatantly one-sided propaganda. For example, their resource material cites without question John Boswell's self-justifying historically revisionist arguments about homosexuality within the Catholic church.

I think the judge got it right. This committee endorsed propaganda for teachers who would, in turn, take it into the classroom.