In 2010, Chicago Public Schools (CPS) was facing a dilemma, to deliver a consistent sex education program in a complex and diverse school district. Four years earlier, the school board had adopted a policy calling for students in grades 5 through 12 to receive family life and comprehensive sex education. To help support schools in meeting this requirement, CPS purchased access to HealthTeacher, a popular online K-12 health education program used by hundreds of other school districts around the country as a comprehensive and affordable approach to health education. CPS was particularly interested in using HealthTeacher to provide sex education to middle school students as a way to help prevent future teen births and risky sexual behaviors among district students. The district made program lessons easily accessible to middle school teachers throughout the district. In this study, we evaluate the impacts of a CPS demonstration project to support the implementation of HealthTeacher in a select number of Chicago 7th grade classrooms.
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