Senior student Katelyn Campbell of George Washington High School, West Virginia, has been battling her school’s administration over their methods of sex education.
Katelyn Campbell, soon-to-be high school graduate
The conflict was sparked when Pam Stenzel, an international speaker and avid promoter of teen abstinence, was recently invited to speak at the school. Campbell refused to attend the event, claiming that Stenzel was engaging in “slut-shaming” and making her fellow students uncomfortable. Campbell then filed a complaint with the ACLU and publicly voiced her concerns about the backwardness of sex education in her school. This was met with backlash from the school principal, George Aulenbacher.
“The only way to guarantee safety is abstinence,” spoke Aulenbacher about Stenzel’s school-sponsored talk. “Sometimes that can be a touchy topic, but I was not offended by her.” The principal, in reaction to Campbell speaking to the press about this topic, reportedly threatened to call Wellesley College, where Campbell has been accepted, to report her “bad character”.
Campbell told the Charleston Gazette, “I should be able to be informed in my school what birth control is and how I can get it. With the policy at GW, under George Aulenbacher, information about birth control and sex education has been suppressed. Our nurse wasn’t allowed to talk about where you can get birth control for free in the city of Charleston.”
Campbell’s cause is also being supported by some of her fellow students, who together plan to raise the issue at a local board of education meeting this very evening.
via Think Progress
image via the Charleston Gazette
