By Daniel de Vise
Washington Post Staff Writer
Thursday, June 14, 2007

The addition of one bit of guidance for teachers to the new sex education lessons for Montgomery County public schools was a small 11th-hour victory for members of a citizens advisory committee who had felt shut out of the educational process they were empaneled to advise.

Superintendent Jerry D. Weast on Monday told school board members that his staff would add a brief passage to the new sex education lessons that also instruct teachers on how to answer a specific question if asked by a student: "Is homosexuality an illness?" The answer: It is not, according to the American Psychiatric Association.

Board members Tuesday approved the lessons, with that addition, effectively expanding the two 45-minute lessons from a six-school pilot program to full implementation in eighth- and 10th-grade health classes this fall.

The last-minute tweak was a concession to the advisory committee, and it might have helped Weast and his staff keep control of the curriculum.

Members of the committee, a group representing parents, educators and a variety of other stakeholders, lobbied Weast and board members intensely late last week to make additions to the lessons, which they said offered students too little information to counter misconceptions about homosexuality and homosexuals, such as whether sexual orientation is a choice and whether homosexuals can lead happy lives.

Committee members said the lessons, which define various terms related to sexual orientation and teach the virtue of tolerance, offered little information to answer such basic student questions as whether homosexuality is normal and healthy. The lessons are tightly scripted, and teachers are told to direct student questions to a "trusted adult" if they stray from the material in the lessons.

"I can't explain it, and I don't understand it, and I wish I did, why they're not putting this information in the curriculum," said Richelle Meer, a member of the citizens committee who has a daughter at Montgomery Blair High School in Silver Spring. "We feel that these are things that kids are talking about even before eighth grade."

School board members faced similar lobbying in January, when the classroom materials came up for initial approval as a pilot program. After first pushing for the addition of a raft of statements more supportive to gay, lesbian and transgender students, committee members retreated to requesting the addition of a single sentence, instructing that mainstream medical and mental health organizations have concluded that homosexuality is not a disease or a mental illness.

The suggestion divided board members, who split 4 to 4 on a motion by board member Patricia O'Neill (Bethesda-Chevy Chase) to instruct teachers to provide the statement upon a student's request. The motion died.

O'Neill said this week she "felt it was not sufficient to say, 'If a student asks the question, send them to a trusted adult.' . . . That's not an answer. That's punting."

In advance of this week's meeting, the advisory committee again urged Weast and board members to augment the lessons with several statements: That fleeting same-sex attraction does not equate to homosexuality, that homosexuality is neither a disease nor a mental illness, that it is not a choice, that homosexuals can live happy lives and be successful parents and that children raised by same-sex couples do "just as well" as those who are not.

O'Neill said she planned, at the least, to renew her motion of January. But O'Neill received word late Friday that Weast planned to add that language to the lessons himself. Members of the citizens advisory committee said they were pleased with the slight addition to the lessons, although they would have preferred that all of their recommendations be adopted.

David Fishback, the former chairman of the committee, termed it "a very, very important step," although he said the provision of a specific answer to a specific question from a curious student would do no good for "the child who is afraid to ask."

Opponents of the sex education lessons, who generally said that homosexuality should not be taught as a topic in sex education, said they had no objection to the added language.

"We have never claimed homosexuality to be a mental illness," said Michelle Turner, spokeswoman of Citizens for a Responsible Curriculum, the lead opposition group.