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2011 SESSION

11101966D
SENATE BILL NO. 967
Offered January 12, 2011
Prefiled January 11, 2011
A BILL to amend and reenact § 22.1-207.1 of the Code of Virginia, relating to family life education.
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Patron-- Northam
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Referred to Committee on Education and Health
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Be it enacted by the General Assembly of Virginia:

1.  That § 22.1-207.1 of the Code of Virginia is amended and reenacted as follows:

§ 22.1-207.1. Family life education.

The Board of Education shall develop by December 1, 1987, standards of learning and curriculum guidelines for a comprehensive, sequential family life education curriculum in grades K through 12. Such curriculum guidelines shall include instruction as appropriate for the age of the student in family living and community relationships; the benefits, challenges, responsibilities, and value of marriage for men, women, children, and communities; abstinence education; the value of postponing sexual activity; the benefits of adoption as a positive choice in the event of an unwanted pregnancy; human sexuality; human reproduction; dating violence, the characteristics of abusive relationships, steps to take to avoid sexual assault, and the availability of counseling and legal resources, and, in the event of such sexual assault, the importance of immediate medical attention and advice, as well as the requirements of the law; the etiology, prevention and effects of sexually transmitted diseases; and mental health education and awareness.

Each school division shall implement the standards of learning for the family life education program promulgated by the Board or a family life education program consistent with the guidelines developed by the Board that shall have the goals of reducing the incidence of pregnancy, sexually transmitted disease, and substance abuse among teenagers. Any curricula used in such programs must be medically accurate and evidence-based.

All such instruction shall be designed to promote parental involvement, foster positive self concepts and provide mechanisms for coping with peer pressure and the stresses of modern living according to the students' developmental stages and abilities. The Board shall also establish requirements for appropriate training for teachers of family life education, which shall include training in instructional elements to support the various curriculum components.

For the purposes of this section, "abstinence education" means an educational or motivational component which has as its exclusive purpose teaching the social, psychological, and health gains to be realized by teenagers' abstaining from sexual activity before marriage.

"Medically accurate" means supported by peer-reviewed research conducted in compliance with accepted scientific methods and recognized as accurate and objective by leading medical, psychological, psychiatric, and public health organizations and agencies, and, where relevant, published in peer-reviewed medical literature.