The survey was given in conjunction with the Family Life Program. There were no complaints against the Program, only with the survey.
The Board voted to proceed with the Program without the survey.
The following comments are by elected School Board Member Doug Johnson writing for himself rather than for the Board:
Comments on Sex Survey
by Douglas R. Johnson
January 12, 2010
It appears that a survey to determine the effectiveness of various teaching methods and or full curricula is fully allowed by law, especially where informed consent is given.
Parents are given the right to review all materials used in the classes where sex, euphemistically called "family life", is discussed.
UNINTENDED CONSEQUENCES
Notwithstanding the legality of the concept of a survey, the actual survey itself must not have unintended consequences that are potentially harmful to the students.
It is a well known fact that tests are instructional also and not just measurements. That means that when you test, you also reinforce. That reinforcement is a positive phenomena of a well designed test.
We are all well familiar with the objectionable question, "When did you stop beating your wife?" This example demonstrates how a question can be slanted on purpose. What we are dealing with here is an objection on a basis of the consequence of the questions without dealing with the motive in the formation of the question.
To take the above example a little further, consider the theoretical survey questions:
1. Did you ever beat your wife?
2. How often do you beat your wife?
3. When was the last time you beat your wife?
What you are saying in such a survey is that wife beating is quite common. Some beat their wives regularly. If you beat your wife occasionally, you are probably better than those that beat their wives more often.
Now to have a wife, one needs to be an adult and would take such a survey with a grain of salt. It would not cause any real harm to a person with a normal state of mind.
But we are talking about sex with very impressionable children. Extra care needs to be given. If you ask how often one participates in truly despicable act, it implies some level of acceptance of the act, especially to the mind of a child.
The effect of a child opting out from the survey does not limit the negative consequences to the school population as a whole. The confidential treatment of the survey ends with each and every child that does take that survey. By that I mean that each child will talk about the survey and its questions with all the children in the total school population whether those other children want to hear about the survey or not.
"Why not try it? The school even admits that lots of people do it all the time!" Perhaps mature adults can cope with such an argument. But how do you think teenagers will respond when their hormones are flowing?
You may note that I specifically refer to "children" rather than "students". I do that to emphasize that the student population we are dealing with are all children. Referring to then as students tends to downplay the significance of them being impressionable children.
SURVEY PURPOSE
The specific regulation, 45 CFR 46.101(b), concerning sex surveys relates to "Research conducted in established or commonly accepted educational settings, involving normal educational practices, such as (a) research on regular and special education instructional strategies or (b) research on the effectiveness of or the comparison among instructional techniques, curricula or classroom management methods."
While some questions in this survey do measure the effectiveness of the program itself, the good part of the survey is a blatant attempt to just gather data about Fluvanna children. These questions clearly do NOT deal with "education instructional strategies" nor with "the effectiveness of or the comparison among instructional techniques, curricula or classroom management methods".
NEW QUESTIONS
The biggest objections raised are with the questions involving "oral sex". Quoting from the December 15, 2009 letter sent home with the children:
"Our evaluation firm, The Institute for Research and Evaluation, was incorporated in 1986 and has never connected individual survey results with individual names. Over the past 20 years they have collected data from more than 500,000 teens, and currently collect over 100,000 surveys a year."
This statement indicates 20 years of doing surveys on "more than 500,000 teens". Let's compare that with the Evaluation Report provided by "our evaluation firm". Page 3 indicates that this firm only started with Worth Your Wait in about 2007. Furthermore it also states that they "developed a stronger survey" for the 2008-2009 school year. Skipping to page 10 we see that Fluvanna was the "first program ... that asked about oral sex".
Dr. Evans, who prepared this report stated: "I was surprised to see...." and then on page 11: "Interestingly, 83% of youth of that age...." I give these quotes to indicate just what the real purpose of this survey is general sexual knowledge about Fluvanna children.
All of the detail analysis is summarized on page 11 where Dr. Evans states: "The first thing to recognize is that you [Worth Your Wait program] are having an impact on program youth, but the effect is small." All of the "agree/disagree" questions are listed in various categories to demonstrate the simple conclusion of a "small impact".
But the questions on oral sex and actual intercourse are definitely NOT used in judging "the effectiveness of or the comparison among instructional techniques, curricula or classroom management methods". Dr. Evans states on page 10: "I wanted to know if these were the same kids who were having intercourse, so I crossed the two groups and found a higher-than-expected overlap." Apparently Dr. Evans has other uses for the data than the stated purpose for these new questions.
Certainly science will be advanced by the gathering of this data on the sexual activity of Fluvanna children. But the Fluvanna Public Schools are not the place to gather such data.
RECOMMENDATIONS
We have the right to move a survey from an "opt-out" to an "opt-in". The lowest form of permission is opt-out. Certain activities require the higher opt-in by law. But there is no prohibition for the Board on its own initiative to require opt-in when the law says opt-out is enough.
I believe that any survey dealing with sexual information be first presented to the Board for review. The Board will then decide whether or not the opt-in be required.
Furthermore I was not pleased to find that the December 15, 2009 letter was sent home with my grandson in Middle School as a simple sheet, not even in an envelope.
Any communication concerning anything of a sexual nature needs to be communicated directly to the parents without going through the hands of the children, not even in a sealed envelope. Otherwise, how could a parent "opt-out" if the child fails to deliver the document. I would consider this a "necessary cost of doing business".
Just because the law requires a survey, it does not relieve the Board of its responsibility of evaluating the survey itself. The survey must deal exclusively with the requirements of the survey and not be objectionable on its face.
In this particular survey, the survey goes far beyond the requirements in evaluating the program and, on that basis alone, should be rejected in its entirety.
This survey is also objectionable on its face because of asking sexually explicit question of the child's actual sexual behavior.
The child's actual sexual behavior is not relevant to the effectiveness of the program.
The survey asks unrelated race questions and family questions which give basis of "data mining" where sexual activities can be correlated with race and family structure. I find this not only objectionable but also racist and also very troubling.
I believe the program itself is good and should be continued with the opt-out permission requirement.
I believe further that any survey concerning sexual subjects be dealt with as a separate issue requiring a separate opt-in permission requirement.
I further believe that this survey, being recently changed, should be rejected completely and should a new survey be proposed in the future, we should evaluate that on its own terms.
For this situation this semester, we should proceed with the program without the survey.
END
It appears that a survey to determine the effectiveness of various teaching methods and or full curricula is fully allowed by law, especially where informed consent is given.
Parents are given the right to review all materials used in the classes where sex, euphemistically called "family life", is discussed.
UNINTENDED CONSEQUENCES
Notwithstanding the legality of the concept of a survey, the actual survey itself must not have unintended consequences that are potentially harmful to the students.
It is a well known fact that tests are instructional also and not just measurements. That means that when you test, you also reinforce. That reinforcement is a positive phenomena of a well designed test.
We are all well familiar with the objectionable question, "When did you stop beating your wife?" This example demonstrates how a question can be slanted on purpose. What we are dealing with here is an objection on a basis of the consequence of the questions without dealing with the motive in the formation of the question.
To take the above example a little further, consider the theoretical survey questions:
1. Did you ever beat your wife?
2. How often do you beat your wife?
3. When was the last time you beat your wife?
What you are saying in such a survey is that wife beating is quite common. Some beat their wives regularly. If you beat your wife occasionally, you are probably better than those that beat their wives more often.
Now to have a wife, one needs to be an adult and would take such a survey with a grain of salt. It would not cause any real harm to a person with a normal state of mind.
But we are talking about sex with very impressionable children. Extra care needs to be given. If you ask how often one participates in truly despicable act, it implies some level of acceptance of the act, especially to the mind of a child.
The effect of a child opting out from the survey does not limit the negative consequences to the school population as a whole. The confidential treatment of the survey ends with each and every child that does take that survey. By that I mean that each child will talk about the survey and its questions with all the children in the total school population whether those other children want to hear about the survey or not.
"Why not try it? The school even admits that lots of people do it all the time!" Perhaps mature adults can cope with such an argument. But how do you think teenagers will respond when their hormones are flowing?
You may note that I specifically refer to "children" rather than "students". I do that to emphasize that the student population we are dealing with are all children. Referring to then as students tends to downplay the significance of them being impressionable children.
SURVEY PURPOSE
The specific regulation, 45 CFR 46.101(b), concerning sex surveys relates to "Research conducted in established or commonly accepted educational settings, involving normal educational practices, such as (a) research on regular and special education instructional strategies or (b) research on the effectiveness of or the comparison among instructional techniques, curricula or classroom management methods."
While some questions in this survey do measure the effectiveness of the program itself, the good part of the survey is a blatant attempt to just gather data about Fluvanna children. These questions clearly do NOT deal with "education instructional strategies" nor with "the effectiveness of or the comparison among instructional techniques, curricula or classroom management methods".
NEW QUESTIONS
The biggest objections raised are with the questions involving "oral sex". Quoting from the December 15, 2009 letter sent home with the children:
"Our evaluation firm, The Institute for Research and Evaluation, was incorporated in 1986 and has never connected individual survey results with individual names. Over the past 20 years they have collected data from more than 500,000 teens, and currently collect over 100,000 surveys a year."
This statement indicates 20 years of doing surveys on "more than 500,000 teens". Let's compare that with the Evaluation Report provided by "our evaluation firm". Page 3 indicates that this firm only started with Worth Your Wait in about 2007. Furthermore it also states that they "developed a stronger survey" for the 2008-2009 school year. Skipping to page 10 we see that Fluvanna was the "first program ... that asked about oral sex".
Dr. Evans, who prepared this report stated: "I was surprised to see...." and then on page 11: "Interestingly, 83% of youth of that age...." I give these quotes to indicate just what the real purpose of this survey is general sexual knowledge about Fluvanna children.
All of the detail analysis is summarized on page 11 where Dr. Evans states: "The first thing to recognize is that you [Worth Your Wait program] are having an impact on program youth, but the effect is small." All of the "agree/disagree" questions are listed in various categories to demonstrate the simple conclusion of a "small impact".
But the questions on oral sex and actual intercourse are definitely NOT used in judging "the effectiveness of or the comparison among instructional techniques, curricula or classroom management methods". Dr. Evans states on page 10: "I wanted to know if these were the same kids who were having intercourse, so I crossed the two groups and found a higher-than-expected overlap." Apparently Dr. Evans has other uses for the data than the stated purpose for these new questions.
Certainly science will be advanced by the gathering of this data on the sexual activity of Fluvanna children. But the Fluvanna Public Schools are not the place to gather such data.
RECOMMENDATIONS
We have the right to move a survey from an "opt-out" to an "opt-in". The lowest form of permission is opt-out. Certain activities require the higher opt-in by law. But there is no prohibition for the Board on its own initiative to require opt-in when the law says opt-out is enough.
I believe that any survey dealing with sexual information be first presented to the Board for review. The Board will then decide whether or not the opt-in be required.
Furthermore I was not pleased to find that the December 15, 2009 letter was sent home with my grandson in Middle School as a simple sheet, not even in an envelope.
Any communication concerning anything of a sexual nature needs to be communicated directly to the parents without going through the hands of the children, not even in a sealed envelope. Otherwise, how could a parent "opt-out" if the child fails to deliver the document. I would consider this a "necessary cost of doing business".
Just because the law requires a survey, it does not relieve the Board of its responsibility of evaluating the survey itself. The survey must deal exclusively with the requirements of the survey and not be objectionable on its face.
In this particular survey, the survey goes far beyond the requirements in evaluating the program and, on that basis alone, should be rejected in its entirety.
This survey is also objectionable on its face because of asking sexually explicit question of the child's actual sexual behavior.
The child's actual sexual behavior is not relevant to the effectiveness of the program.
The survey asks unrelated race questions and family questions which give basis of "data mining" where sexual activities can be correlated with race and family structure. I find this not only objectionable but also racist and also very troubling.
I believe the program itself is good and should be continued with the opt-out permission requirement.
I believe further that any survey concerning sexual subjects be dealt with as a separate issue requiring a separate opt-in permission requirement.
I further believe that this survey, being recently changed, should be rejected completely and should a new survey be proposed in the future, we should evaluate that on its own terms.
For this situation this semester, we should proceed with the program without the survey.
END
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