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While DeKalb County’s largest public school district will update its sex education curriculum in line with new state standards ahead of the upcoming academic year, Sycamore School District 427 is choosing to opt out, district officials said.
That doesn’t mean sex education won’t be taught in Sycamore schools, however, Superintendent Steve Wilder said.
In DeKalb District 428, the district plans to adopt new state standards along with guidance from the state. Up until now, DeKalb sex education curriculum included the now repealed standards, said Superintendent Minerva Garcia-Sanchez.
“We teach sex ed within our health education/core curriculum and value the continuance of this education,” Garcia-Sanchez said. “Since the state has adopted these standards and we are continuing such education then we must implement these newly adopted standards with the guidance from the state.”
Ahead of the 2022-2023 school year, districts are choosing to opt in or out of the National Sex Education Standards signed into law last year by Gov. JB Pritzker, taking effect for the upcoming school year.
In signing the bill, Pritzker said the NSES standards would help keep children safe, but the standards have become a target for some parents, conservative groups and religious leaders across the state who contend the standards are not appropriate, especially at the elementary school level.
School districts that do not provide comprehensive sexual health education are not required to adopt the standards and parents may choose for their children to opt out.
School districts that do teach personal health and safety standards to elementary students, as well as comprehensive sex education to middle and high school students, are required to follow NSES curriculum guidelines.
DeKalb District 428
Garcia-Sanchez said the district has fielded a few messages from community members, but maintains that it will continue to teach sex education as appropriate for each grade level.
“A few community members have reached out to seek clarification about the standards and we have informed them that we will continue to teach sex education that is age and developmentally appropriate to our students embedded within our core curriculum and health education,” she said. “It is important to protect and educate our students so they understand healthy boundaries, relationships, correct anatomical terminology, and sexual development.”
Sycamore School District 427
Wilder said while Sycamore public schools won’t opt in to the new standards, the district will continue to teach age-appropriate sex education curriculum.
“We integrate topics related to child/student development as appropriate,” Wilder said. “For example, we touch on puberty in the upper elementary grades and middle school. It comes up again in the high school curriculum. It’s not a stand-alone class, we just integrate it when it’s appropriate. We touch on topics generally and leave room for families to have additional conversations at home.
Sycamore parents also can opt their children out of existing district curricula if desired, Wilder said, an option he said parents have taken the district up on “from time to time.” Like DeKalb, Wilder said he’s fielded some communications from parents related to the NSES standards, which won’t be adapted into existing District 427 curriculum.
“Age appropriate topics are covered in some of our other classes, such as Physical Education and Health,” he said. “We are maintaining the existing curricula in those areas.”
Wilder said he believes Sycamore’s sex education standards provide students a comprehensive understanding.
It’s important that our curricula in all areas covers topics that are relevant to our students in a way that is appropriate for our students and which best reflects the values of our students and their families,” Wilder said. “We felt that our existing curricula covered relevant topics in an appropriate way already, and therefore adopting a comprehensive program aligned with the national standards wasn’t necessary.”
Sandwich School District 430
Sandwich SD430 also is opting out of the new NSES standards.
Superintendent Tom Sodaro said the school board spoke last year about adopting the standards, but in a straw poll decided against it, and they will not be voting to adopt them this year.
“I think that for some things, we still need local control and we need our stakeholders involved,” Sodaro said. “I also believe that some of the topics are questionable at the grade levels that they should be introduced.”
Sodaro said the district does not have comprehensive health programs or full health classes, and that none of the school district’s funding is going to be spent on sex education, but instead will be used to foster social emotional learning by adding support staff such as social workers, nurses and reading specialists.
Sodaro said the sex education curriculum in SD430 has not changed much in the time he has been in the district, but social workers and nurses have been added to the staff in recent years to help students and families with any questions and concerns they may have.
“Now we have social workers at every building,” Sodaro said. “That has been very helpful when we have students who need to talk.”
Currently, sex education in the district starts in fifth grade, with an optional program called Candor. Previously called Robert Crown, Candor includes a field trip during which students learn about body changes, social-emotional skills and healthy growth.
Candor also recently transitioned to a remote format, which Sodaro said makes students more comfortable asking questions, since they can ask anonymously and don’t have to raise their hand and speak in front of their friends.