Critics on one side fear a slide toward no discussion of sex. Those on the other believe more restrictions on classroom content are needed.
Pennsylvania is not among the 22 states, as its schools must teach health, safety and physical education but are not required to teach sex education. That will likely change in the 2003-04 school year.
An approved change in state regulations will require Pennsylvania public schools to teach abstinence and HIV/AIDS prevention in sixth, ninth and 12th grades when sexually transmitted diseases are discussed, said Shanna McClintock, a spokeswoman for the state Department of Education.
Delaware requires only that abstinence be included in the curriculum.
The split in opinion extends into Kearns' classroom. Sara Grossman, a 17-year-old junior, said: "Kids need to know their options to make safer and wiser decisions. We should know all the choices."
Others in the class and elsewhere say health teachers should spend more time teaching abstinence as the only sure way to avoid unwanted pregnancies, sexually transmitted diseases, and HIV/AIDS.
In Salem County, a growing number of Pennsville School District parents are demanding curriculum changes.
"I don't want them walking away with a how-to list of how to do it," parent Tamara Chastain said. "I think we're promoting kids to be more and more sexually active and to be promiscuous."
But some educators - including members of the New Jersey Education Association, the state's largest teachers' union - call the abstinence mandate an unwarranted intrusion into the classroom.
"The legislature should have stayed out of it," said Edithe Fulton, president of the New Jersey Education Association. "They aren't living in the real world. We know the kids are sexually active."
