Dear Council of the District of Columbia,

The individuals and organizations who have signed below are writing to you in support of making sexual education within Washington, D.C. inclusive for lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender (LGBT) students.

Though the District of Columbia requires schools to offer sexual education to its students, the current programs are not mandated to include information that is pertinent to LGBT populations. Current Health Education Standards in D.C. mandate programs to discuss and define sexual orientation, but fail to require appropriate sexual health instruction for LGBT students be provided. Therefore, LGBT individuals within D.C. do not have a consistent source for sexual education despite the fact that they constitute a significant portion of the HIV population. The HIV/AIDS Epidemiology Update of 2008 reported that 40% of the HIV positive population within D.C. constituted of men who have sex with other men (MSM). Also, the 2013 D.C. MSM Study, which surveyed 500 gay men, found that 8.5% of the sampled men under the age of 30 were HIV positive. Also, it is important to note that these statistics do not reflect the health risks that lesbian women, bisexual women, or transgender individuals face, as very little data has been collected on the health issues of those populations.

The state of California’s Sexual Health and HIV/AIDS Prevention Education Act of 2004 ensures that existing sexual education programs within the state provide appropriate instruction and material for students of all sexual orientations. Based on 2010 and 2012 studies by the Center for Disease Control and Prevention, California is reported to be among the lower density states for cases of chlamydia and gonorrhea. The state cannot act as a model example for sexual health risk prevention because California does not require all schools to provide sexual education, but its law does ensure that available sexual education programs are all inclusive.

Currently within D.C., some students are receiving sexual education that is inclusive of all sexual orientations due to their teacher’s discretion. Teachers could offer it themselves or invite other organizations to provide such instruction. By offering all-inclusive sexual education to every school, D.C. students would know how to live sexually healthy lives by internalizing the information that is pertinent to them. We all hope and look forward to making all sexual education programs in D.C. appropriate for LGBT students.