PT  - JOURNAL ARTICLE
AU  - Fine, Michelle
TI  - Sexuality, Schooling, and Adolescent Females: The Missing Discourse of Desire
AID  - 10.17763/haer.58.1.u0468k1v2n2n8242
DP  - 1988 Apr 01
TA  - Harvard Educational Review
PG  - 29--54
VI  - 58
IP  - 1
4099  - http://harvardeducationalreview.org/content/58/1/29.short
4100  - http://harvardeducationalreview.org/content/58/1/29.full
SO  - herp1988 Apr 01; 58
AB  - Michelle Fine argues that the anti-sex rhetoric surrounding sex education and school-based health clinics does little to enhance the development of sexual responsibility and subjectivity in adolescents. Despite substantial evidence on the success of both school-based health clinics and access to sexuality information, the majority of public schools do not sanction or provide such information. As a result, female students, particularly low-income ones, suffer most from the inadequacies of present sex education policies. Current practices and language lead to increased experiences of victimization, teenage pregnancy, and increased dropout rates,and consequently, ". . . combine to exacerbate the vulnerability of young women whom schools, and the critics of sex education and school-based health clinics, claim to protect."The author combines a thorough review of the literature with her research in public schools to make a compelling argument for "sexuality education" that fosters not only the full development of a sexual self but education in its broadest sense.