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Medical professionals, educators, parents and students are sharply criticizing proposed policy changes to human growth and development education not just in the Wausau School District, but in communities around the state.

The proposed changes are being recommended by Neola, an independent policy consultant company that provides policies and periodic policy updates, to school districts throughout Wisconsin and five other states. Florida, Indiana, Michigan, Ohio and West Virginia are the additional four.

The policy update, which was shelved this week in Wausau after a swift public backlash, would have removed “Medically accurate and age-appropriate instruction in the health benefits, side effects and proper use of contraceptives and barrier methods approved by the Federal Food and Drug Administration to prevent pregnancy and barrier methods approved by the Federal Food and Drug Administration to prevent sexually transmitted infections.” The proposed language also removed discussion of body image and gender stereotypes.

Parents and students who spoke Monday during a Wausau School Board committee meeting as well as three dozen of those who submitted written comments opposed the proposed changes. Most comments focused on the removal of contraceptives from the policy language and prioritizing an abstinence-only-before-marriage approach, terming the proposal “dangerous,” “backward” and “counter-productive.” Others saw the proposed changes as imposing Christian and conservative ideology on students. As a result, district administrators will present a revised policy draft in two weeks to the board.

The criticism is not just limited to Wausau.

In Cedarburg, nine people including eight medical professionals submitted a statement blasting the proposed changes.

“Once again, the Cedarburg Board of Education is attempting to make a radical, regressive change to Human Growth and Development education in Cedarburg,” the statement reads. “At the school board policy meeting on March 30, changes to the policy statement on HGD education were proposed. These changes represent a huge step backwards in educating our children.”

Those who signed the statement specifically criticized an abstinence-only approach to teaching about human growth development and sexual education. Teen pregnancy is falling across the United States. But there are states where it is still high. Seven of the states with the highest teen birth rate have abstinence-only instruction.

“Exhaustive evidence shows programs that only teach about abstinence fail miserably in the most important outcomes – preventing teen pregnancy and Sexually Transmitted Infections (STIs),” the statement reads. “Comprehensive, evidence-based programs have been shown to delay the onset of sexual activity, decrease numbers of partners and increase the use of condoms and contraception.”

The Cedarburg School Board reacted by sending each of the individuals who signed a cease-and-desist letter, calling their statement false and defamatory and said the proposed changes were not made by the School Board.

The policy changes were recommended by Neola.

“Neola updated the human growth and development policy to reflect the language and substance of Wisconsin Act 216 of 2011,” Dr. Steven LaVallee, an Associate at Neola Wisconsin, told Wausau Pilot & Review. He added that the firm monitors state and federal laws as well as court decisions and made suggested updates as appropriate.

“Neola is not removing (instruction related to contraceptives and barrier methods to prevent pregnancy and sexually transmitted/infectious diseases),” LaVallee said. “There is additional emphasis on abstinence. So when we updated the policy as per Act 90, we ensured it also reflected the changes recommended by Act 216.”

But Act 216 was enacted in April 2012, 11 years prior to the policy changes.

Dr. LaVallee said that when Neola was trying to align policy with WI Act 90, passed in November 2021, the group realized that it had not previously updated the policy as per the WI. statute 118.019. The statute does not have contraceptives in its recommendation.

Some conservatives across the country have recently focused their attention on sexual education curriculum. Some of them have gone to the extent of saying that teachers who speak about sexuality are “grooming” students. LaVallee denied that the company was being influenced by conservative policy preferences. “We do not advocate far right or far left policies,” the Neola associate said.

WI Act 90 explains the process under a state statute (48.195) “under which a parent of a newborn child may relinquish custody of the child to a law enforcement officer, emergency medical services practitioner, or hospital staff member.”

LaVallee said section sub 2.a of the statute 118.019 (that refers to “reproductive and sexual anatomy and physiology,” among others) was a recommendation. But if a school board provided instruction in any of the areas under sub. 2a, it also had to provide the following instruction in the same course and during the same year: abstinence-only approach under section sub 2m. It “emphasizes that abstinence from sexual activity before marriage is the only reliable way to prevent pregnancy and sexually transmitted diseases, including human immunodeficiency virus and acquired immunodeficiency syndrome.”

The Neola associate also emphasized it was up to the school boards to accept or reject the updates.

 “That doesn’t mean a district can’t include contraceptives,” he said. But when it did so, he added, it also had to include a required instruction under section sub 2m.

Indeed, that seems to be the approach by at least two other area schools.

Dr. Kristine A. Gilmore, Superintendent of D.C. Everest Are School District said there are no current changes to the D.C. Everest Human Growth and Development Policy. “We are aware there are recommended changes specifically around Wisconsin Act 90 and will address those in future policy review with the school board.”

“When we receive policy suggestions from Neola, it is our practice at D.C. Everest to review them as to how they fit our district,” Gilmore told Wausau Pilot & Review, when asked whether the district would remove contraceptive education. “I do not foresee us making large-scale changes to this policy other than those reflecting the law update to Act 90.”

Dr. Gilmore is stepping down after June and the incoming superintendent, Dr. Casey Nye, said he “will defer to her response on behalf of the district.”

The situation is similar at the Stevens Point Area Public School District.

“The Stevens Point Area Public School District is not at this time considering changes to this policy,” Sarah O’Donnell, Director of Communications at Stevens Point.

Mosinee School District superintendent David Munoz did not respond to questions.

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