Abstinence Education Funded Grant Program
At first, program guidance issued by MCH allowed grant recipients some flexibility in how they spent the funds. For instance, MCH did not require states and their sub-grantees to emphasize all eight elements of the definition equally, even though grantees could not provide information that contradicted any of the eight points. Beginning in FY2005, however, when the Bush administration moved the funding to another division within the Department of Health & Human Services (HHS), grant announcements eliminated this flexibility, asking states instead to “develop programs that place equal emphasis on each element of the abstinence education definition.”
By 2007, grant announcements stated that “each element of A through H should be meaningfully represented in all grantees’ federally funded abstinence education curricula.” The latest grant announcement also required states to provide assurance that funded programs and curricula “do not promote contraception and/or condom use.” In addition, in an effort to ensure that funds would not be spent on pre-adolescents, the targeted population was redefined as “adolescents and/or adults within the 12 through 29-year-old age range.” The newest age definition also included “other adults such as parents or professionals that desire training in how to support decisions to delay sexual activity until marriage.” “Focal populations” under this newer definition included: students at local universities, colleges, or technical schools; single adults involved in a local community or community-based organization; and single parents in their 20s.
This tightening of program requirements, including the new directive to target adults, has contributed to an emerging revolt against abstinence-only sex education. States have now turned down millions of dollars in federal grants. The number of states that refused Title V abstinence-only funding has grown from one (California) in the first year to eight in FY2007 (California, Connecticut, Maine, New Jersey, Montana, Ohio, Rhode Island, and Wisconsin).
Abstinence-only funding to the states was first administered by MCH. However in 2004, the Bush administration transferred oversight of the program to the Administration for Children, Youth, and Families (ACF), a more ideologically driven division within HHS. ACF has also assumed jurisdiction over Community-Based Abstinence Education (CBAE), a more restrictive funding stream for abstinence-only education.
There's no single reason abstinence-only education proved largely ineffective, researchers say. A major factor, to be sure, was the incomplete information it provided about contraceptives and their use. "The programs that have by far the strongest evidence that they have a positive impact ... are those that give the message that not having sex is safest, but if you have sex always use condom and contraception," says Kirby. Message aside, the curriculums themselves were often found to be riddled with inaccuracies. Two major reviews of abstinence curriculums--one in 2004 from the House of Representatives' Committee on Government Reform, another by the Texas Freedom Network Education Fund earlier this year--found unsourced and incorrect information about STDs, contraceptives, and the consequences of sexual activity. The Texas report, which collected data from over 96 percent of the state's school districts, found one curriculum teaching that condoms have "little to no benefit." (The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention describes condoms as "highly effective in preventing the sexual transmission of HIV infection and reduce the risk of other STDs" when used consistently and correctly.) Another incorrect abstinence-only lessonused in the Baird Independent School District: "a young person who becomes sexually active at or before age 14 will contract an STD before graduating from high school. This is no longer the exception, but the rule." Religious influence was another problem for some abstinence-education programs; the American Civil Liberties Union mounted a number of lawsuits (some successful, some not) against abstinence-only curriculums in public schools and state-sponsored events that advanced a specific religious perspective.
