SANTA FE, NEW MEXICO – IW Features, a project of Independent Women’s Forum, is a new platform dedicated to providing unique and personal insights into the biggest issues facing Americans today through grassroots storytelling and original journalism. Today, IW Features is highlighting a group of New Mexico parents who spoke out against the state’s public education department after it exposed seventh graders to inappropriate topics such as sexually transmitted diseases and rape.
The New Mexico Public Education Department included Dr. Jill Biden’s article, titled “Girls Around the World Are Standing Up For Their Rights,” in the summer 2024 reading program for seventh graders who need literacy tutoring. The article, which Time Magazine published in 2016, tells the story of Memory Banda. In this Time article, Jill Biden describes the Malawian “initiation camps” as a twisted “coming-of-age ritual” that teach girls as young as nine years old how to “please their future husbands” by forcing them to have sex with adult men, some of whom intentionally infect the girls with HIV and other diseases. Banda, in the story, however, refused to participate in a Malawian “initiation camp” after witnessing the damage done to other girls who dutifully followed the disturbing tradition. Instead, she chose to get an education.
The students participating in the summer reading program read Jill Biden’s article about Banda that discussed inappropriate issues for 11 and 12 year olds including sexually transmitted diseases and rape.
The New Mexico Freedoms Alliance provided IW Features an email from the New Mexico Public Education Department notifying all teachers and tutors participating in the summer reading program to the fact that “7th grade material has been perceived as inappropriate or upsetting by several families […] After this article was used, several families had to have difficult conversations regarding rape and sexual consent with their 11- and 12-year-old children.”
While the article was eventually removed from the summer reading program, participants had already read it.
While the state’s Health Education Content Standards require that students start learning about the reproductive system around 6th grade, they do not learn about sexually transmitted diseases or unintentional pregnancy until 9-12th grade. The state also requires that parents have the option of opting their children out of sex education classes, which did not occur in this situation.
Ashley McClure, IW Features Assistant at Independent Women’s Forum, said: “No parent signing their child up for summer literacy tutoring expects to be forced into a conversation about molestation and rape, but that’s exactly what happened to New Mexico parents this summer. Inappropriate and disturbing sexual content making its way into children’s hands is unfortunately a growing problem, and state education departments must take notice before more students are harmed.”
Read Ashley’s full story here.