One of the oft repeated comments of characters in my novel, The Sex Ed Chronicles is that in the absence of sex education, children learn about sex from their friends. However, the novel is based on 1980, before schools in New Jersey high began to engage students in peer counseling.

Day Valentine's Day 2008, I read about a mini-controversy involving peer counseling in a news site New Jersey web radio. The news coverage went high school in New Jersey: Clearview Regional High School in Harrison Township in the southern part of the state. There, the parents object to the peer counselors, third year and high school seniors, freshmen advice on a variety of topics related to sex education. The counseling model comes from a program Teen named Pep. Designed by the Center for Leadership Training Princeton (not affiliated with Princeton University), Teen Pep has been implemented in over 50 schools Garden State high in the last eight years. Thus, Pep adolescents is not a new program and school districts have had time to investigate its merits, only that Now, a school has made the news.

Teen Pep train not only students but faculty advisors, to work one on one, but as a advisory team in different situations. Schools recruitment Teen Pep working with the Princeton Center for a minimum of two years and no control field visits by qualified professionals to help ensure the program is running smoothly. A school participating in the Teen Pep makes an investment considerable intellectual and financial investment to make it work. Part of this investment is to explain this program to parents.

That brings me to lesson number one: if they are unwilling to take seriously these investments do not.

As I read about the incident at Clearview High, became clear to me that the fault lies not with the program, but with the school administration. It would have been easier for them to consult parents and clergy from the get-go, since it is supposed to do. I realize that teachers are opposed to this, they did in 1980, "but sex education is an issue where parents and clergy believe that have important opinions and knowledge.

I was interested to read that an advisory board was formed after parents objected to the individual aspects of the program. That should have been in force since the first day.

Which brings me to lesson number two: after consultation with parents, decide what subjects the students are trained to discuss with their peers.

Parental Clearview objection stems from the idea that "children were teaching children to have sex. But there had to be clear differences among the subjects teenage peer counselors are allowed to teach, and those who had to be covered by a qualified teacher of sex education, but they do in the press. Parents deserve to know, if asked before school started. I realize that organizations pro-abstinence speakers also use young people, their programs must be subject to the review of parents like the peer counseling program.

Then I get to lesson number three: Make sure you have qualified teachers.

The federal No Child Left Behind Act emphasizes the need for qualified teachers, which means that a teacher must be certified in the subject they teach. That applies to sex education as anything else. In the example of Clearview high, the program leader was an English teacher. When I got to family education, I learned that education instructors more likely to emerge from sexual education in health, home economics and social studies and nursing. I also assume that you could become qualified sex educators counselors, who handle personal problems of students as part of their job description.

It appears Teen Pep is working in most schools, only one school is in the news complain, but those who participate in this program should consider offering an alternative: use degree candidates in counseling and education to students with a lawyer.

This would not be peer counseling, but it would placate parents who care about children to teach children about sex. Also contribute to professional development for sex educators.

Stuart Nachbar operates EducatedQuest.com, a blog on education politics, policy and technology. He has been involved with education politics and economic development as an urban planner, government affairs manager, software executive, and now as a writer. His first novel, The Sex Ed Chronicles, about sex education and school politics in 1980 New Jersey, earned a coveted “Publishers Choice” selection from iUniverse.

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