September 15, 2022

“How do we support our LGBTQIA+ students?”

September 15, 2022/ Jill Herbertson

We have been back to school and working with educators for a month now, and it’s so gratifying to serve our returning clients as well as students and staff on campuses that are brand new to us. But regardless of where our client schools are or how long we have been working with them, the biggest area of concern for staff and administrators is most often, “How do we support our LGBTQIA+ students?” A hugely important question, to be sure, when we have ample evidence that LGBTQIA+ youth are more likely to have suicidal thoughts or attempts, personal safety issues and lower academic achievement than their cisgender and heterosexual peers. We are delighted that Chris Angel Murphy (they/them) breaks it down for us.

August 17, 2022

Sex Education is Relevant Year-Round--by Beth Rendeiro, Director of Outreach & Engagement

August 17, 2022/ Beth Rendeiro

Many schools and educators understand the need for and benefits of comprehensive sex education for their students. In some states, including California, sex education is mandatory for students of certain ages. But for some reason many schools wait until the last three months of the school year to schedule their programming. Is it something about spring? We don’t know each school’s reasons but here are some reasons to schedule the sex education program during the fall or winter.

June 15, 2022

Iceland’s Outstanding Progressive Values About Sexuality--by Dr. Allie Melendez

June 15, 2022/ Dr. Allie Melendez

Sprakkar - an ancient Icelandic word meaning “outstanding women”

Eliza Reid, The First Lady of Iceland, has lots to say about Iceland’s historic and present attitude toward women to give us non-Icelanders proof that closing the gender gap is possible. Upon hearing that Eliza was promoting her book, Secrets of the Sprakkar, at a local temple in Los Angeles, I proceeded to order a ticket, purchase her book, and binge it. Like the lifelong learner I am, I did my homework.

Six years ago, Eliza was given a role with little to no job description when her husband, Gudni Johannesson, was elected President of Iceland.

May 11, 2022

MTSE supports abortion as a valid option for those who do not wish to carry a pregnancy to term

May 11, 2022/ KC Slack

As an educational non-profit organization, it is not MTSE's role to lobby the government. However, as an organization committed to the values of consent and justice, as well as an organization located in one of the states which has signaled its dedication to retaining and even expanding abortion rights, education is absolutely our role.

Read on for some important facts:

May 11, 2022

Picture Book Picks for Families With Early Learners! Guest Blogger: Stephanie Guerrero

May 11, 2022/ Stephanie Guerrero

We asked Stephanie, our More Than Sex-Ed Spring 2022 Intern from California State University Northridge, to get comfy in the picture book section of the children’s library and make some recommendations. Here are some joyful stories we think you will want to read aloud with some youngsters in your life!

“Red, A Crayon’s Story” by Michael Hall—

Who is Red? Well that's the point, Red starts to raise questions about Identity. Red is a blue crayon but with a red label and he just hasn't been feeling himself.

April 13, 2022

Join us in Celebrating 28 Years of The Wall Las Memorias: Providing Sex-Ed for Social Change

April 13, 2022/ Carlos Huerta, Community Organizer

The Wall Las Memorias (TWLM) is a community health and wellness organization dedicated to serving Latino, LGBTQ+ and other under-served populations through advocacy and education while building the next generation of leadership. More Than Sex-Ed (MTSE) is so happy to be developing new connections with the TWLM team. The important work they have been doing for nearly three decades aligns with our MTSE mission so well, and we are delighted to be participating in the Rooted and Rising Community Youth Fair on May, 14th, 2022, at 2 PM hosted by TWLM At Plaza de La Raza in Lincoln Heights, Los Angeles. This event will focus on providing adolescents with FREE health services and workshops, as well as raising awareness and community support for young advocates, substance use prevention, and LGBTQ+ youth and their families. We hope to see you there!

March 09, 2022

Sex and Fantasy Suites–by MTSE Master’s Degree Candidate Intern, Nayla Lee

March 09, 2022/ Nayla Lee

My first reaction to finding out about the fantasy suites on The Bachelor was disbelief. It was the late Spring of 2018, and I was in a hotel room in Detroit at a Planned Parenthood conference. I was reeling from a breakup and had only recently decided to throw myself into the arms of the 14th Bachelorette, Becca Kufrin. My assigned roommate, a stranger, asked if I was looking forward to fantasy suites in the upcoming episode. I didn’t know what she was talking about-- I was not yet the Bachelor historian that I am now.

I was floored when she explained fantasy suites as “the place where the contestants have sex.”

February 10, 2022

The Untold History of the First PRIDE

February 10, 2022/ Yali Bitan

-by guest blogger and MTSE Advisory Board Member Yali Bitan, they/them

Years before pride was associated with corporate parades, gay folks had to fight for their right to party.

Many people associate the beginning of gay activism/organization/protest with the 1969 uprising at the Stonewall Inn in New York, but few know about the Black Cat protest of 1967.

At the time, homosexual activity was criminalized, and gay bars were routinely raided by police. “Kissing was a crime; cross-dressing was a crime. If you were arrested and identified as being gay, you could lose your job, your income, your house, your family." - Alexei Romanoff activist & owner of New Faces, another local gay bar.

January 12, 2022

Guest Blogger Griselda Gines, B.S., Public Health, Shares Her Journey Story

January 12, 2022/ Griselda Gines

This past fall, Cal State Northridge Intern Griselda Gines researched external professional development opportunities for the MTSE team. She has expressed to us that this internship allowed her to reflect upon the importance of sexual health education, and to understand that comprehensive sex ed includes a broad scope of issues. She has written this deeply personal blog post in which she shares her personal truth, which has helped to heal and strengthen her. We’ve loved having Griselda as part of our team, and we are certain she will continue to advocate for healthy conversations about sex.

TW: child sexual abuse, sexual assault, miscarriage

I grew up in a strict Catholic Mexican household in which, as a woman, we had daily chores to do and were expected to behave a certain way. Every Sunday we attended mass and had dinner at 6pm everyday followed by chores and our favorite telenovelas. At an early age, my two sisters and I knew when there was anything sexual being displayed on TV; we had to look away. My grandmother took care of her 7 grandkids until I was six years old. After that my sisters and I would stay home alone until my parents came home.

November 10, 2021

We're Back! Live & In Person!

November 10, 2021/ Emmalinda MacLean

One of the highlights of being on campus is running into students from previous years, and the Pasadena Waldorf High School students made our day when a group of them saw us walking into the main office, and one announced to her friends, “Those are the sex-ed people!”

Yep, that’s us, we’re back, and it’s great to see you too.

October 13, 2021

Reality+ Love+ Dating+ Relationships+ Reality Dating Shows & Sex Education: Guest Blogger Nayla Lee Asks, “What Is TV Teaching?”

October 13, 2021/ Nayla Lee

Guest blogger Nayla Lee writes:

“Everyone knows that The Bachelor’s main goal is to portray healthy relationships and positive sexuality!

“Just kidding!

“The evolution of shows like The Bachelor, which has been airing for nearly two decades, reflects what producers and editors believe is an acceptable depiction of love, intimacy and relationships, and has the capacity to influence what viewers see as mainstream or normative. This cyclical relationship, through which the show is shaped by pop culture and, in turn, shapes it, makes it a rich topic for analysis. From the perspective of More Than Sex Ed’s sexuality and relationship programming, I am excited to share a very condensed version of my main takeaways from consuming the Bachelor franchise and related media.”

September 08, 2021

MTSE Co-Founder Emmalinda MacLean Trains Sex-Ed Teachers for a New Texas Organization

September 08, 2021/ Emmalinda MacLean

I’ve been joking for years that my life’s mission is to raise an army of sex educators. Well, the joke is on Texas, because last month we started the Dallas branch. I couldn’t be prouder to support a like-minded startup taking flight in another city, and I am in deep admiration of the courage of the Texan sex-educators I met there.

If you’re wondering what qualifies a person to be a comprehensive sex-educator, or how we can teach someone to do it in a weekend, think about how people become parents. There’s a lot to know and to learn, it’s the work of a lifetime to get good at, but you don’t have to be perfect or know everything to be a great parent to a child who needs you.

August 10, 2021

The Questions Students Are Asking — and why they’re important! By Guest Blogger Sam Joson

August 10, 2021/ Sam Joson

More Than Sex-Ed gives students the opportunity to ask questions anonymously after each class session. Sure, there’s always a fair number of troll questions, but most of them truly show the different ways young people are learning to move through the world. Below, we explore the kinds of questions students are asking by grade level and why it’s important to pay attention to what they want to know.

June 07, 2021

Someone asked us recently about our favorite books to give the parents of a new baby, and we couldn’t love this question more.

June 07, 2021/ Emmalinda MacLean

A family library builds a love of literacy from a young age, and reading to a child is proven to be one of the best things a caring adult can do to support their cognitive development. Reading together creates opportunities for healthy affection and intimacy, like ensuring that some pleasant snuggling time is a regular part of a bedtime routine.

Here are some of our favorite children’s books with beautiful art and meaningful messages that we encourage you to share with the tiny humans you love…

April 07, 2021

9-12 Year Olds and “Performative Discomfort”

April 07, 2021/ Emmalinda MacLean

There’s a certain kind of behavior we sometimes see from preteens, especially when class is discussing body parts or functions, that we describe as “performative discomfort”. Kids this age will go out of their way to tell us that they find the material “gross”, they use the barfing-emoji, they tell us they’re disturbed, they ask why we have to talk about these matters before lunch. Sometimes they seem to be telegraphing to their peers that they consider this topic taboo or off limits. We understand—and we remind students—that discomfort is a natural and very understandable part of the learning and growth process.

March 03, 2021

Brave New World: The Perks of Virtual Sex Ed

March 03, 2021/ Emmalinda MacLean

I trust that by now we’re all pretty familiar with the frustrations and drawbacks of online education, and we join with parents and students in hoping to be back in classrooms in person as soon as it’s safe to do so. But the more virtual sex-ed classes we present, the more we’ve noticed certain unmistakable advantages to the remote model too—and we hope to be able to re-create some of these benefits in a post-pandemic future.

March 02, 2021

Destigmatizing Pleasure to Dismantle Sexual Shame

March 02, 2021/ Jill Herbertson

Even as a very young child, I was aware of the stigma and taboo surrounding the subject of sex. Society’s discomfort with sex was apparent in the hushed tones people tended to use when speaking of it; it was apparent in the flustered demeanor my parents adopted when I would ask a question about a line in a movie, or a song; and it was apparent in the fact that, when I was 10 years old, my mom took me out of the house (“an outing, just the two of us”) in order to have “the talk” in private.

December 09, 2020

Spotlight on Our Shift to Online Learning

December 09, 2020/ Emmalinda MacLean

When our school clients switched to remote-learning in the spring, we, like so many other educators, figured out a brand new way to teach.

We’ve learned about so many online tools for teaching, but thankfully lots of the familiar elements of our workshops are part of our e-learning program, and a lot of the questions from kids are reassuringly the same. Teens are wondering about body parts and media messages and masturbation and just what exactly causes a pregnancy, or wondering if they can make their sex-ed teacher laugh. (They often can. One of the perks of the job). But some questions we’ve never had to answer before: one young person asked “will I ever have a first kiss because of covid?”

November 04, 2020

Raising Anti-Racist Kids!

November 04, 2020/ Emmalinda MacLean

Helping parents and caregivers have hard conversations with kids is one of our favorite things to do. Last month, we debuted a new program to do exactly that: supporting family discussions about race and anti-racism with the same values-centered lens we encourage for talks about sex and sexuality. The client (Akamai) was our first international corporation, and the program was a joint venture between their employee-parent group and their employees-of-color group. Our first session was a hit, full of lively chatter and awesome questions, and a much larger-than-expected turnout. We’re looking forward to our next workshop and we’d love to bring this program to a parent group near you!

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