About a dozen middle schools in Boston are participating in a pilot program that requires them to provide comprehensive sexual health instruction to students in the hopes of effectively preventing the spread of chlamydia. That sexually transmitted infection, which is the most commonly reported in the country, is hitting young people in Boston particularly hard.

In the last several years, there have been more than 4,800 new cases of chlamydia reported each year in the Boston area. Since most of those cases occurred among young people between the ages of 15 and 24, city officials are trying to figure out how to target that demographic with the sexual health information they need to better protect themselves. The Boston Public Health Commission conducted focus groups among the neighborhoods with the highest rates of infection, and found that young people are putting themselves at risk mainly because they don’t know very much about chlamydia — which often doesn’t present obvious symptoms.

“We find that youth in the focus groups tend to get their information from other youth, who may or may not have the story right,” Anita Berry, the director of infectious disease at the Boston Public Health Commission, told WGBH News.

Teens reported that they were having unprotected sex because they believed several misconceptions about how STDs are spread. “One was believing that they couldn’t get infected if they withdrew early during sexual intercourse,” Berry explained. “Other reasons were if your partner said they were your one and only, clearly they don’t have any infection and you don’t need to use any type of protection. They also felt that they often didn’t need protection because their partner was asymptomatic.”

Only eight of Boston’s 32 public high schools taught the district’s sexual health education curriculum this year. But some school districts voluntarily began including more information about sexual health in their curricula when they saw the results from Berry’s focus groups. And school administrators don’t want to stop there — they hope to expand comprehensive sex ed to more middle and high schools, and they’ll vote on a new district-wide wellness policy this week.

And their efforts may soon be bolstered by new statewide standards. A measure currently being considered in the Massachusetts legislature would require all of the state’s public school districts to include comprehensive, medically accurate sex ed material in their health classes. Massachusetts does not currently have any requirements that public schools must provide sex ed. Although some schools do opt to provide sexual health information, others choose to teach abstinence-only curricula that don’t include information about birth control.

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Health officials have repeatedly warned that the United States is facing “epidemic” levels of sexually transmitted infections. Ohio is no exception. Last year, in the state’s most populous county — Cuyahoga County, which includes the Greater Cleveland area — new cases of HIV infections soared to the highest level they’ve been in six years.

So, in order to effectively combat the growing public health crisis, which disproportionately impacts youth, high school students are stepping up to help educate their fellow teenagers about safe sex. Through a grant-funded program at Case Western Reserve University’s Infectious Disease Alliance, teens are being trained as “peer educators” so they can communicate directly with people their own age. As the Plain Dealer reports, the team of young people — who were selected from a pool of applicants from several Ohio high schools — received months of sexual health instruction from medical experts to help them design a public health plan that targets the zip codes with the highest rates of STD infection.

“In general, peer education is a tried and true approach,” Amanda Healan, a co-director of the Infectious Disease Alliance who has been working to raise funds for the program since 2009, explained. According to Healan, peer educators can effectively reach teens “before their sexual debut so they have information on how to have safe sex before they have sex.”

The high schoolers in the program offer weekly counseling at a health clinic located adjacent to a county high school. They provide the teens who visit the clinic with safe sex kits that include condoms, information about the Infectious Disease Alliance, hand sanitizer, and encouraging handwritten notes with messages like “Stay safe!” and “Thanks for coming.” The peer educators also travel to different high schools to conduct after-school programs and workshops with youth. They ask their peers to define safe sex in their own words, teach them that a sexual partner can’t give their consent if they’re drunk or high, and refute popular myths like the idea that women can’t get pregnant if they have sexual intercourse while standing up.

Often, that information is better received when it’s coming from a fellow teen instead of from a teacher or a parent. The sexual health advocacy group Advocates for Youth points out that including teens in sex ed programming helps ensure that the approach is relevant — and that the information actually sticks. “The value of peer educator programming is that it has far greater reach than adults could ever have,” Advocate for Youth’s senior program manager, Angel Brown, told the Plain Dealer. “Young people are engaging with other youth in settings that go beyond the clinics and the community settings.”

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Earlier this month, a Tennessee high schooler recorded an abstinence education assembly spearheaded by two right-wing leaders — and after details emerged about the topics discussed at the public school event, medical experts confirmed that they weren’t “completely accurate.” Health officials refuted some of the material, and local politicians expressed surprise that Tennessee’s public school students have been receiving false information.

As the Tennessean reports, the conservative speakers included Joi Wasill — who founded a nonprofit organization with strong religious, Republican, and anti-abortion ties — and Beth Cox, a member of a Tennessee county school board. The two women delivered an hour-long presentation for the freshmen and sophomores at Hillsboro High School. Wasill and Cox told students that all medical textbooks confirm that life begins at conception, there’s a new STD spreading around the country that’s worse than AIDS, contracting STDs will leave women infertile, and having sexual relations with eight different partners is the equivalent of drinking a whole classroom’s spit.

Cox told the young women in the room that if they became single mothers to boys, their sons wouldn’t have the necessary male role models in their lives to teach them “hunting, fishing, playing ball, all those things that teach them how to be a man.” During the second half, after Wasill took over, she asserted that “fetus” means the same thing as “baby” and adoption should always be assumed to be the best option. If a girl is pregnant, send her straight to the nurse and give her prenatal vitamins, Wasill recommended. She also warned that abortion carries the risks of internal bleeding and death.

Dr. Mary Romano, the assistant professor in Vanderbilt’s Division of Adolescent Medicine, told the Tennessean that Wasill and Cox don’t have all of their facts straight. Many of their assertions are taken out of context — for instance, STDs only lead to infertility if they go untreated, and there’s no medical consensus about when life begins. Similarly, a spokesperson from Tennessee’s Department of Health said the agency is unaware of any new STD that is “worse than AIDS.” Wasill was likely referring to widely-debunked reports of a new strain of gonorrhea that health experts do not believe is actually comparable to the HIV/AIDS epidemic.

Another local school board member, Michael Hayes, told the Tennessean that he was “surprised” by the information imparted to students at the abstinence assembly. “Fortunately, I believe the Hillsboro High School kids are smart enough to separate fact from fiction and that some of the opinions and scare tactics used in the presentation they will know are incorrect,” he wrote in an email.

But even if students are able to discern the presentation’s factual inaccuracies, they’ll still be left unequipped with the actual knowledge they need to safeguard their sexual health. Romano pointed out that scare tactics intended to dissuade teens from becoming sexually active don’t actually work, because young adults tend to believe they’re invincible from any negative repercussions. Instead, teens need factual information about prevention methods.

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Illinois public schools will be required to include medically accurate information about birth control in their sex ed classes under a measure that the state legislature passed this week. HB 2675, which Gov. Pat Quinn (D) is expected to sign into law, will prohibit health classes from teaching abstinence-only curricula.

Illinois’ current law requires sex ed classes to emphasize abstinence as “the expected norm,” and stipulates that “course material and instruction shall stress that pupils should abstain from sexual intercourse until they are ready for marriage.” Public schools can choose between teaching abstinence-only education, using a mix of stressing abstinence while providing comprehensive information about birth control and condoms, or simply declining to provide any sex ed instruction. Under HB 2675, schools won’t be able to choose the abstinence-only option anymore — they’ll need to either offer comprehensive information about prevention methods, or decide not to offer any sex ed courses whatsoever.

State Sen. Linda Holmes (D) spearheaded the measure because she doesn’t believe that abstinence-only curricula adequately equips teens with the resources they need to safeguard their sexual health. “In fantasy land, we teach our kids abstinence — and they listen. But we know they don’t necessarily follow that advice,” Holmes explained. “They are going to be confronted with the issue of sex before they’re 21 years old, or 25, or whenever they decide to get married.”

Holmes is right. By their 19th birthday, seven in ten American teens will have had sex. And even the Americans who grow up in socially conservative communities aren’t delaying sex until marriage — by some estimates, 80 percent of unmarried evangelical Christians have had sex at least once. But when those young people become sexually active, they often don’t understand how to effectively protect themselves. Since abstinence-only classes often mislead students about the facts about contraception, 60 percent of young adults underestimate birth control’s effectiveness and are more likely to skip it because they don’t believe it will make a difference.

Abstinence education can also have lasting consequences for adolescents’ sense of self-worth. Because messages emphasizing abstinence and sexual purity often teach students that sexual activity is something be ashamed of, the youth who receive those messages may internalize those feelings of guilt and shame.

While banning abstinence-only education is a step in the right direction, HB 2675 still allows Illinois schools to opt out of providing any type of sexual health education. Luckily, some school districts in the state have already taken matters into their own hands to ensure their students will receive the information they need. Chicago’s public school system recently instituted a standardized policy for requiring age-appropriate comprehensive sexual health information in every grade.

Most U.S. states saw a dramatic drop in their teen birth rates between 2007 and 2011, according to new data from the Centers for Disease Control. The national rate of teen births declined by 25 percent, and some individual states saw their rates drop by 30 percent or more:

Every single state except for West Virginia and North Dakota showed some kind of decline in the number of teenagers giving birth. But significant regional disparities remain. The CDC found that the lowest rates of teen births are in New Hampshire, Massachusetts, Connecticut and Vermont — which each have rates under 17 births per 1,000 teen girls — while Arkansas and Mississippi have the highest rates at about 50 per 1,000. Overall, the highest rates of teen births continue to be concentrated in the South.

The CDC’s research builds on previous data that showed the United States’ teen pregnancy rate has plunged to record lows since 1991, largely because of adolescents’ expanded access to contraception. “Credit goes to teens themselves who are clearly making better decisions about sex, contraception, and their future,” Bill Albert, the chief program officer of the National Campaign to Prevent Teen and Unplanned Pregnancy, told the Associated Press.

But those type of preventative health resources aren’t equally available to teens in every part of the country. Over the past decade, teen pregnancy rates have consistently been higher in Southern states that don’t provide students with adequate sexual health instruction. Since abstinence-only courses often present misleading information about contraception, a full 60 percent of young adults underestimate birth control’s effectiveness and are more likely to skip it because they don’t believe it will make a difference. And teens in rural areas still struggle to access contraception, partly because there are fewer health clinics in less populous places and partly because a societal stigma surrounding teen sexuality still pervades conservative communities.

Unfortunately, this correlation isn’t limited to teen pregnancy and teen births. Southern states that don’t offer comprehensive sex ed classes also have the highest rates of STDs.

As the United States has continued to grapple with addressing its teen pregnancy rates — which are higher than the rates in any other developed nation — there has been some debate over the best tactic to effectively lower the rate of unintended teen births. Public health campaigns to dissuade adolescents from becoming pregnant typically rely on shame-based tactics that tell young women they will be failures if they become pregnant. But there’s evidence to suggest that providing youth with the support they need through community programs, rather than shaming them about their sexuality, is actually a more effective way to encourage them to make healthy sexual choices.

Elizabeth Smart became a household name after she was kidnapped from her home in Salt Lake City, UT at the age of 14 and held in captivity for nine months. She was forced into a polygamous marriage, tethered to a metal cable, and raped daily until she was rescued from her captors nine months later. Smart was recovered while she and her kidnappers were walking down a suburban street, leading many Americans who followed her story on the national news to wonder: Why didn’t she just run away as soon as she was brought outside?

Speaking to an audience at Johns Hopkins about issues of human trafficking and sexual violence, Smart recently offered an answer to that question. She explained that some human trafficking victims don’t run away because they feel worthless after being raped, particularly if they have been raised in conservative cultures that push abstinence-only education and emphasize sexual purity:

Smart said she “felt so dirty and so filthy” after she was raped by her captor, and she understands why someone wouldn’t run “because of that alone.”

Smart spoke at a Johns Hopkins human trafficking forum, saying she was raised in a religious household and recalled a school teacher who spoke once about abstinence and compared sex to chewing gum.

“I thought, ‘Oh, my gosh, I’m that chewed up piece of gum, nobody re-chews a piece of gum, you throw it away.’ And that’s how easy it is to feel like you no longer have worth, you no longer have value,” Smart said. “Why would it even be worth screaming out? Why would it even make a difference if you are rescued? Your life still has no value.”

Now in her mid-twenties, Smart runs a foundation to help educate children about sexual crimes. She now believes that children should grow up learning that “you will always have value and nothing can change that.”

Social psychologists and sexual abuse counselors agree that comprehensive sex education can help prevent sexual crimes. Teaching children about their bodies gives them the tools to describe acts of abuse without feeling as embarrassed or uncomfortable, and it also helps elevate their self-confidence and sense of bodily autonomy. A shame-based approach to genitalia and sexuality, on the other hand, sends kids the message that they can’t discuss or ask questions about any of those issues.

Nonethless, abstinence-only education programs have a long history of imparting harmful messages that shame youth about their sexuality instead of teaching them the facts they need to safeguard their health. A high school in West Virginia recently made national headlines after hosting a conservative religious speaker who allegedly told students “if you take birth control, your mother probably hates you” and “I could look at any one of you in the eyes right now and tell if you’re going to be promiscuous.” In Smart’s home state of Utah — which is home to a large religiously conservative Mormon community — sex education is currently mandated, but lawmakers have repeatedly pushed to weaken the state law and reinstate an abstinence-only curriculum.

As George Washington High School’s student vice body president, Katelyn Campbell believes it’s her responsibility to stand up for her classmates. That’s why, when her public school’s administrators brought a conservative religious speaker to advocate for “God’s plan for sexual purity” at a mandatory assembly, the West Virginia teen began to speak out against the “slut-shaming” messages that she doesn’t want at her school. Now, after Campbell’s story has inspired strangers from around the country to offer their support to her cause, she has a message for other teens: Don’t give up the fight for comprehensive sex ed.

“No one should have to feel alone or afraid of repercussions for doing the right thing,” Campbell told ThinkProgress. “If I was able to succeed in the socially-conservative state of West Virginia, then anyone can.”

In Campbell’s conservative community, she did face some opposition after voicing her opposition to the dangerous misinformation perpetrated by abstinence-only education. Her high school principal, George Aulenbacher, threatened to call the college where she’s been accepted to tell them about her “bad character” after she began speaking to the press. At a Board of Education meeting this past Thursday to address the brewing controversy, three people spoke on behalf of Campbell and a staggering 37 people spoke against her. A Facebook group emerged in support of Campbell’s principal.

But Campbell has stood strong — seeking an injunction against Aulenbacher to protect her First Amendment rights, as well as calling for his resignation — and her efforts are having an impact. At last week’s board meeting, the President of the School Board acknowledged that he believes “stricter scrutiny” should be applied to the speakers who are invited to speak at GW High School. Campbell and her fellow students have presented their case about Aulenbacher, and a hearing this week will determine his future. And Campbell’s story has struck a nerve with the thousands of people who have reached out to her to express their support.

At first, Campbell was surprised at all of the positive responses she received after her story went public. “I’ve gotten hundreds of messages from people across the country that thank me for sticking up for myself — some have even used the word ‘hero’ — which still hasn’t sunken in,” she said in an interview with ThinkProgress.

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Ohio lawmakers failed to advance an amendment to the state budget that would have prohibited sex ed classes from including any instruction of “gateway sexual activity” under penalty of a potential $5,000 fine. News of the provision sparked outrage earlier this week, particularly since banning any health materials that might “condone” sexual contact doesn’t have much to do with the state’s economic policy.

However, that doesn’t mean Ohio Republicans have dedicated themselves to focusing solely on the state’s finances. The state budget also contains a provision to defund Planned Parenthood — the third time that lawmakers have attempted to strip funding from the national organization within the past year alone — that the House successfully advanced on Thursday. If it ultimately becomes law, it will “re-distribute” the family planning dollars that used to go to Planned Parenthood to right-wing crisis pregnancy centers that don’t provide the same types of reproductive health services.

Even after Katelyn Campbell’s principal allegedly threatened her for speaking out against a “slut-shaming” abstinence assembly recently held at her public high school, the West Virginia teen refused to back down. Her brave stance against the dangerous misinformation perpetrated by abstinence-only education, as well as her perseverance in the face of opposition from the school’s officials, has inspired thousands of people across the country to stand behind the high school senior in support.

After George Washington High School hosted conservative religious speaker Pam Stenzel to advocate for “God’s plan for sexual purity” at a mandatory assembly, Campbell notified the ACLU. Once the press began taking interest in the situation, Campbell’s principal wasn’t pleased — in fact, she says he threatened to call Wellesley College, where she has been accepted to study in the fall, to tell them that Campbell is a “backstabber” who has “bad character.” That threat ended up badly backfiring. Here’s what has unfolded over the past several days:

Wellesley College released public statements welcoming Campbell to campus in the fall. After news broke that Katelyn’s principal allegedly suggested he planned to call Wellesley to complain about Katelyn, a spokesperson for the college provided the following statement to ThinkProgress: “Wellesley College is delighted to welcome Katelyn Campbell as a member of the Class of 2017 this fall. The Wellesley community fosters a living and learning environment where diverse opinions, ideas, and perspectives are not only welcomed, they are encouraged.” The academic institution also welcomed Katelyn with supportive messages on Twitter and Facebook.

A Wellesley College alumni group started a petition to applaud Campbell. A group called the Wellesley Sisters began a petition on Change.org to let Campbell know she’ll fit right on in campus in the fall. “In reality, your actions prove that the College couldn’t be a better fit,” the petition reads. “At Wellesley you will find students just like you: strong, independent, intelligent women who speak their minds and work to make the world a more just and equitable place.” It currently has over 1,200 signatures.

Fellow students formed a Facebook page called “Friends of Katelyn Campbell.” The Facebook page has been verifying some of the complaints that Campbell took to the ACLU, including an image of the religious flyer used to promote the event at the public high school. It has since extended beyond West Virginia, as people across the country have flooded the page with messages of solidarity. “Katelyn is an inspiration to anyone who treasures the First Amendment and values honor and courage,” reads one recent post from an ally in Indiana.

Students attended a local school board meeting this week to advocate on behalf of Campbell. On Thursday night, students took up the issue with the school board. Campbell’s lawyer advised her not to attend, but other advocates represented her point of view on her behalf. According to an update on the “Friends of Katelyn Campbell” page, the meeting was not necessarily productive. “Unfortunately, as was to be expected, Katelyn’s message continued to be chastised this evening,” the update stated. “Speakers on her behalf were berated to the point of tears, and one board member broke protocol to burst out that there needed to be more god in school and that Pam Stenzel ‘should speak in all schools.’ ”

Strangers submitted letters of support after reading Campbell’s story. After publishing a story about Campbell earlier this week, ThinkProgress has been contacted by numerous people commending the teen’s actions and requesting her contact information to share letters of support. One reader was inspired to write an open letter that he intends to deliver to Campbell’s principal. “I wanted to congratulate you and your institution for producing such an accomplished student,” the letter reads. “Surely you must feel privileged to know that you have presided over the education and awakening of such an student as accomplished as Campbell.”

A West Virginia high school student is filing an injunction against her principal, who she claims is threatening to punish her for speaking out against a factually inaccurate abstinence assembly at her school. Katelyn Campbell, who is the student body vice president at George Washington High School, alleges her principal threatened to call the college where she’s been accepted to report that she has “bad character.”

George Washington High School recently hosted a conservative speaker, Pam Stenzel, who travels around the country to advocate an abstinence-only approach to teen sexuality. Stenzel has a long history of using inflammatory rhetoric to convince young people that they will face dire consequences for becoming sexually active. At GW’s assembly, Stenzel allegedly told students that “if you take birth control, your mother probably hates you” and “I could look at any one of you in the eyes right now and tell if you’re going to be promiscuous.” She also asserted that condoms aren’t safe, and every instance of sexual contact will lead to a sexually transmitted infection.

Campbell refused to attend the assembly, which was funded by a conservative religious organization called “Believe in West Virginia” and advertised with fliers that proclaimed “God’s plan for sexual purity.” Instead, she filed a complaint with the ACLU and began to speak out about her objections to this type of school-sponsored event. Campbell called Stenzel’s presentation “slut shaming” and said that it made many students uncomfortable.

GW Principal George Aulenbacher, on the other hand, didn’t see anything wrong with hosting Stenzel. “The only way to guarantee safety is abstinence. Sometimes, that can be a touchy topic, but I was not offended by her,” he told the West Virginia Gazette last week.

But it didn’t end with a simple difference of opinion among Campbell and her principal. The high school senior alleges that Aulenbacher threatened to call Wellesley College, where Campbell has been accepted to study in the fall, after she spoke to the press about her objections to the assembly. According to Campbell, her principal said, “How would you feel if I called your college and told them what bad character you have and what a backstabber you are?” Campbell alleges that Aulenbacher continued to berate her in his office, eventually driving her to tears. “He threatened me and my future in order to put forth his own personal agenda and make teachers and students feel they cant speak up because of fear of retaliation,” she said of the incident.

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