TORONTO, June 3, 2013 (LifeSiteNews.com) – A high-profile coalition of education and health groups is urging Kathleen Wynne’s Liberal government to reintroduce the radical sex ed curriculum that was shelved in 2010 after blowback from parents. That program would have had students learning about “sexual orientation” and “gender identity” as early as grade 3, and oral and anal intercourse as early as grade 7.
The coalition, which is spearheaded by the Ontario Physical Health Education Association and includes SickKids Hospital, the Council of Ontario Directors of Education, the Elementary Teachers' Federation of Ontario, and the University of Toronto, among others, issued a set of reports Monday urging the province to get a new curriculum off the ground by the fall.
They claim that Ontario’s existing 1998 curriculum is “woefully out of date” and ultimately hurting the province’s children. In particular, the groups are concerned that the curriculum needs to be more fully brought into line with the government’s “inclusive education” agenda.
“The 1998 curriculum does not include references to sexual orientation, gender identity, homophobia or families with same-sex parents and is not in alignment with a number of existing provincial policies,” OPHEA wrote on Facebook.
“Students need the knowledge and skills to make informed choices about their health and well-being,” wrote Dr. James Mandigo, president of Ophea’s Board of Directors and Chris Markham, Ophea’s executive director, in a Monday column for the Globe and Mail.
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Though they acknowledge that parents are the “primary educators,” they argue that school curriculum “is the most logical and appropriate place to provide health information, including sexual health education, because schools are the only formal educational institution to have meaningful contact with all students.”
Education Minister Liz Sandals told Xtra that the sex-ed curriculum is not a ‘top’ priority and that it will be at least another year before action is taken.
“To be perfectly honest with you, the top of my pile has been labour-relations issues, which we are still working on, and ensuring we have peace in the [education] land,” she told reporter Andrea Houston. “But [sex ed] is absolutely on my radar.”
“There have been more immediate things that I have to sort out,” she added. “Labour relations is an urgent issue that we need to sort out legislatively over the next six months.”
The new sex-ed curriculum was developed under Wynne during her time as Minister of Education between 2006 and 2010. It would have had sex-ed begin in grade 1 with the naming of genitalia and other body parts. By grade 3, students were to learn about “sexual orientation” and “gender identity,” by grade 6 they would discuss masturbation as “common” and “not harmful,” and by grade 7 they would discuss oral and anal intercourse and learn about the use of condoms.
Though then-Premier Dalton McGuinty initially defended it when it was first introduced, he backed off and said the government needed to do more consulting with parents.
In late January, however, Wynne, who is an open homosexual, promised to reintroduce a similar program after she was elected to takec over from McGuinty as Liberal leader and Premier.
As Minister of Education, Wynne also launched the province’s controversial equity and inclusive education strategy, which culminated in a bill forcing Catholic schools to welcome gay-straight alliance clubs, despite opposition from the bishops.
Along with its reports, OPHEA released the results of a poll they commissioned by Environics indicating that 93% of Ontario parents want an updated sex-ed curriculum. Eighty-seven percent believe that sex-ed should be a component of the health curriculum. The firm polled 1,002 parents of children in Ontario’s publicly-funded system through an online survey from April 6-23.
Ninety percent of parents said they were comfortable with sexuality being taught in the schools. Ninety-six percent indicated their preferred source of such instruction would be the parents, and the same number mentioned health professionals as a preferred source.
In other polls, however, parents have shown far less support when asked about more specific questions. A 2011 poll by Abacus Data found that 59% of Canadians considered it inappropriate to discuss oral and anal sex in grade 7 and 56% percent of Canadians believed it is inappropriate to discuss “gender identity” in grade 3.
Jack Fonseca, Campaign Life Coalition’s project manager, said the curriculum is not about promoting healthy relationships or “safe sex,” but pushing a radical sexual agenda. “This is about normalizing homosexuality by indoctrinating the next generation. In other words, propaganda to further a new sexual revolution,” he said.
“Kids are already over-sexualized in school. We need to reduce the already extreme sexualization of the classroom, NOT increase it,” he added.
“The fruit of this miseducation has been sexual assault, teen pregnancy, abortion and a distorted view of the purpose of sexuality,” he said.
Find a full listing of LifeSiteNews' coverage of the Ontario government's explicit sex-ed program here.