A. L.I. Teen Freedom offers parent education and faculty development workshops so that parents understand.

The goal of L.I. Teen Freedom is to provide the “how” and “why” of abstinence, but also to show students the support that they have for an abstinent lifestyle. We find the most positive outcomes in schools where parents and faculty members understand and reinforce the abstinence message to your students.

Parents overwhelmingly support the values and messages of true abstinence education. Polls show that parents overwhelmingly support the main themes and messages of abstinence education:

• 79 percent of parents want teens to be taught that they should not engage in sexual activity until they are married or at least in an adult relationship leading to marriage.
• 91 percent of parents want teens to be taught that “the best choice is for sexual intercourse to be linked to love, intimacy, and commitment. These qualities are most likely to occur in a faithful marriage.”
• 68 percent of parents want sex education programs to teach that “individuals who are not sexually active until they are married have the best chances of marital stability and happiness.”
• 91 percent of parents want schools to teach that “adolescents should be expected to abstain from sexual activity during high school years.”

These themes are central to abstinence education curricula. By contrast, these messages either do not appear in or are directly contradicted by comprehensive sex ed/abstinence plus curricula. (Shannan Martin, Robert Rector, and Melissa G. Pardue, Comprehensive Sex Education Versus Authentic Abstinence: a Study in Competing Curricula, The Heritage Foundation, forthcoming.)