Sexual Education Travels to the Happiest Place on Earth

It often seems that everyone- parents, teachers, friends- all expect high school students to party and get into trouble. Because of this reputation, it seems unlikely that a group of teenagers would band together to prevent exactly that. However, the program PASSHEN (Peers Advocating Safety and Sexual Health Education NOW!), made up of Berkeley High students, has formed to help teenagers escape this unfortunate stereotype.

For those unfamiliar with PASSHEN, for twelve years, this unique program has visited freshman classes, as well as middle schools, to give speeches about sexual health, drugs, alcohol, and bike safety to students. Their goal is simple: to give students the proper information needed to make good decisions that fit their lifestyles. According to peer educator and BHS senior Rachel Kane, “I think PASSHEN is a great program for Berkeley High because I think youth can relate best to other youth. We don’t tell students ‘no’, rather we tell them ‘know.’ We just want Berkeley High students to be as safe as possible.”

The program is also encouraged by others in the Berkeley community, as coordinator Miranda Walker commented, “As far as I know, teachers, students, parents, and admin have been incredibly supportive of our program and the peer educators.”

PASSHEN accomplishes this by collaborating with coordinators to create effective presentations and activities concerning health issues, then visiting freshman classes to present what they have developed. “PASSHEN coordinators help the group of peer educators reflect on and change curricula, but the youth are the ones who create it and facilitate it in the classroom,” said Walker. “We believe that teens know best what is relevant to their peers, and how they’ll best learn important health information.”

This can be seen through the new “choose your own adventure” style curriculum developed by the peers. In this program, a student is taken through a hypothetical journey, during which he or she must make decisions that affect the outcome of the story. For example, a student might begin an adventure at a party, only to have it end when he or she contracts HIV. This program teaches students about the long term impact of their decisions, and reminds them to make good choices that can help their lifestyle.

How does one get chosen to be in PASSHEN? Every year, the program takes on very few new members, who are chosen through a rigorous process of interviews and mock presentations. This year, 119 students applied to become a part of this program. However, only nine will be chosen. “This year our acceptance rate is lower than most elite colleges including MIT, Brown, and Columbia,” Kane joked.

PASSHEN doesn’t just give presentations. In fact, they run “The Condom Club,” a monthly group that teaches students about forms of contraception and how to use them wisely. They also attend many health conferences throughout the year, and meet with other groups similar to theirs from California. One such group is Friday Night Live (FNL), which collaborates with youth to reduce the number of injuries and deaths caused by drunk driving and has branches all over the country. FNL hosted a conference on September 18 in Anaheim, which was limited to their California chapters as well as similar groups from the state.

Health conference coordinator Lynn Goodwin, who happened to be collaborating with FNL for this specific conference, had previously seen a PASSHEN presentation and invited them to attend and present.

During the conference, Peer educators Janette Calderon and Leya Andrews gave a power-point presentation about the PASSHEN itself, as well as the Choose Your Own Adventure style curriculum they present to freshman classes. Later, the whole group sat at a resource table where they talked intimately with others about what PASSHEN does, why they do it, and gave out toolkits for starting similar programs elsewhere.

As for visiting the happiest place on earth, “Our coordinators thought that it would be cruel to be at a Health Conference at the Disney’s Paradise Pier Hotel and never actually go to Disneyland, so they bought us twilight passes for the first night. Disneyland was a perk of participating in the conference!” exclaimed Kane.
One participant, Texas Thull, added, “It’s beyond magic- It’s Disneyland!”

Photos:

• PASSHEN (Photo credit Janette Calderon)