by Emily Bridges, Director of Public Information Services

There was an interesting article on CNN about access to reproductive health care services at community colleges.

Months before its summit  on community colleges Tuesday, the White House asked Americans to post on its website ideas for community college reform, and vote for their favorite idea.

More than 600 votes were cast before the summit opened. Viewers' favorite proposal came from a former teen mom and community college student in Arizona, and it was not about lowering tuition or expanding the number of parking spaces.

"Educate students on healthy relationships and family planning," Heather Thomas wrote, "in order to help community college students finish their education and then plan for a family when the time is right."

Now, throughout the article the author, who is not particularly renowned for being sex-positive,  keeps making that  "Women should have babies after diplomas" point, and I'm not fully on board with this proclamation, because each woman should have or not have a baby if/when she chooses to do so.  That said, it does bring up an interesting point about community colleges and health clinics.  With the flagging economy, more people are going to community colleges. And people need reproductive and sexual health services and supplies wherever they attend school.

by Martha Kempner

A couple of weeks ago a study on teen sex was presented at the annual meeting of the American Sociological Association in Atlanta and it made headlines in everything from the Associated Press to Bloomberg Businessweek. The headlines varied from: “How Teen Sex Affects Education” to “ Teen sex not always bad for school performance” but all of the articles essentially reported the same thing. Researchers at the University of California, Davis and the University of Minnesota analyzed data on teenagers’ sexual behavior and their educational outcomes and found that having sex as a teen does not necessarily impact a teen’s education. Instead, the important factor is the type of relationship in which teen sex occurs. Specifically, teens who had sex in romantic relationships did not suffer academically whereas teens who had sex in non-romantic relationships did.

by Dan Jubelirer, North Carolina State Youth Activist

A provocative new study presented by the American Sociological Association finds that not all teenage sexual activity leads to worse performance in school.

“It's not so much whether a teen has sex that determines academic success, the researchers say, but the type of sexual relationship they're engaged in. Teens in serious relationships may find social and emotional support in their sex partners, reducing their anxiety and stress levels in life and in school.”

(via AP)

Shocker: a young person’s school performance is not dependent on whether or not that they have sex. This seems to contradict the narrative that right wing, abstinence-only proponents paint: that if we allow teens to think about sex or to have sex, we will be giving rise to a morally depraved and destructive generation of sex crazed young people. News flash: this is simply ridiculous. And more importantly, this philosophy that guides abstinence-only sex education is destructive to young people.


This study backs up what I have believed for a long time: that school performance, morals, and general worth as a person are NOT tied to sexual activities.

by Nicole Cheetham, Director, International Division

As people from around the world, including Advocates for Youth staff and youth activists, begin to gather in Vienna at the International AIDS Conference, there is a new report just released from UNAIDS that includes a youth supplement. 

The new report is a completely different format from previous UNAIDS reports and focuses on all sorts of angles as it pertains to the HIV/AIDS epidemic.  It also puts forward “Treatment 2.0,” a new approach to simplify the way HIV treatment is currently provided and to scale up access to life saving medicines.

While not part of the report itself, of major note is the youth supplement to the report that highlights that “Young people are leading the HIV prevention revolution.”  HIV prevalence among youth is reported to have declined by more than 25% in 15 of the 25 countries most affected by AIDS.  These declines are largely due to the falling new HIV infections among young people, it states.

 The countries where the significant HIV prevalence declines that have been accompanied by positive behavior change among youth include Cote d’Ivoire, Ethiopia, Kenya, Malawi, Namibia, Tanzania, Zambia, and Zimbabwe.

UNAIDS concludes in its report: