Texas got a sex ed update, but students and educators say there's still a lot missing

https://www.npr.org/sections/health-shots/2022/04/30/ [login to see] /texas-got-a-sex-ed-update-but-students-and-educators-say-theres-still-a-lot-miss
Cali Byrd is a junior at Booker T. Washington High School in Dallas. She remembers when a group came to talk to her class about sexually transmitted infections in eighth grade.

The talk involved a bunch of tennis balls with the names of STIs written on them.

"They had a couple of kids come up, put on gloves, and said, 'If he throws the ball to her and she has a glove on, then she's protected. But if she doesn't have a glove on, then she'll get the disease or something,' " Byrd said. "It was really weird."

Byrd said the instructors never explained what the STIs were, just that people should wear condoms to prevent them. "It really was not helpful," she said.

That was the last time she got any sex education in school, Byrd said, as it's not mandatory once kids get to high school.

Instead, in 2020, Byrd started training to be a peer educator through Planned Parenthood of Greater Texas, where she learned details about STIs, and different methods of birth control. "It was a lot of catching up," she said.