Let's Talk About Sex...Education
Do you remember having “the talk” at school?
Your health or physical education class was likely split into two groups where you went over school district specific health curriculum. Perhaps your health teacher did a comprehensive sexual education overview where you learned about anatomy, consent, and safety, or maybe you had an experience similar to the infamous Mean Girls scene.
Regardless of where you live or what you learned, sex education has always been a part of health education.
Before we dive into what’s happening in Michigan, why it’s important, and what you can do to take action, let’s get some facts straight. First and foremost, sex education standards are not curriculum or law; they are simply guidelines from the state that districts can choose to adopt. Many districts opt to follow the state standards, but others choose not to.
Right now, HIV education is the only topic required by law at every building level, and any sex education beyond that is not required by law. If school districts want to teach about puberty, contraception, or any other form of sex education, they have to create a sex education advisory board (SAEB) and get parent feedback. Parents in the district hold half of the seats in the SEAB. The SEAB reviews curricula and recommends it to the board and they ultimately decide if they approve or don’t approve the curricula. Parents have many opportunities to be involved, be heard, and inform what’s adopted.
While there are a few concepts required by law to teach, there are others that are explicitly not permitted by law. For example, family planning devices — like condoms — are not allowed to be disseminated or made available on school property. That means that if a teacher uses a condom for an example, they have to collect every condom after the demonstration. Schools are allowed to show and demonstrate, but cannot provide family planning devices to a student to protect themselves and their partner in the future. Additionally, abortion cannot be discussed as a method for family planning on school grounds. For either of those rules to change, there would have to be a change in the law, and that has to go through the state legislature.
Statewide health standards haven’t been updated since 2007. To put that in perspective, the first iPhone was released in 2007, and the iPhone 17 was released in 2025. Point being, Michigan is long overdue for updates to sex education standards.
Right now, new standards are being proposed for Michigan health courses, including sex education. Within these health standards, the sex education standards are getting the most pushback, and within that, attacks are primarily directed towards content that mentions sexual orientation and gender identity. To be clear, the content is very basic and essentially amounts to providing definitions related to sexual orientation and gender identity, and reaffirming that everyone — regardless of their identity — deserves respect.
Young people across the state have been leading calls for legislators to require consent education and advance a more inclusive curriculum. We support these updates and the emphasis on: mental and emotional health, safety, healthy relationships, balanced eating and physical activity, substance use and misuse, sexual health, personal health and wellness, and community and environmental health.
We all want the same thing: for young people to feel included, supported, and safe in schools so they have the best opportunities to grow, learn, and thrive. These standards are state suggestions for school districts to include additional basic, inclusive sexual health education that is evidence-based and age-appropriate.
Take action today: tell the State Board of Education that you support comprehensive sex education in our schools.
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Michigan Organization on Adolescent Sexual Health (MOASH)
