Helena Sex Ed Policy: All of Montana in Danger?

The Helena school board is reconsidering the sex ed policy it recently debated, but families throughout the entire state of Montana face the possibility of having a similar curriculum taught to their children. Will Deschamps, chair of the Montana Republican Party, pledged that the MT GOP would lead the fight against a statewide version of that policy.

In Helena, the policy called for sex education beginning in kindergarten, and for exposing grade school children to graphic, explicit descriptions of sex.

Deschamps said, "Keeping the Helena sex ed policy from spreading to the rest of the state depends on electing a Republican majority to the Legislature."

He continued, "Democrat legislators and legislative candidates support enacting this kind of sex ed for the whole state. If we want to put a stop to this kind of indoctrination of our children, we need Republicans in the Legislature."

In Montana's 2009 legislative session, House Bill 596 called for spending taxpayer dollars to teach schoolchildren about gender roles, sexual orientation, contraception, morning-after abortion pills, and more. Just like the Helena school board policy, this bill's version of sex ed began in kindergarten.

Republicans killed that bill in committee, but Democrat legislators didn't let that stop them. They then voted on the House floor to try and revive the bill, and every Democrat legislator but one voted to revive it.

In the last session, Republicans were able to kill the bill in committee because the membership was split 50-50. But if Democrats were to gain a majority in the House of Representatives this November, that bill could not only be reintroduced, but might even pass.

In the Helena School Board's July meeting, Democrat legislative candidate Joe Coenhour called a policy that included teaching sixth graders about anal sex "A good step forward."

Chairman Deschamps said, "That's just one example. The Republican party believes this kind of extremist indoctrination of our schoolchildren is wrong, and we are committed to resisting attempts to implement it at the state level."