Senators introduce bill inspired by U-Va. student efforts to prevent rape

Public-high-school health-education classes would be required to include lessons about preventing sexual assaults and relationship violence under a bill introduced by Sens. Timothy M. Kaine (D-Va.) and Claire McCaskill (D-Mo.) Tuesday morning.

Kaine met with student leaders at the University of Virginia in December, following national attention being drawn to the issue of rape and relationship violence on campus.

A now-discredited magazine article about a gang rape horrified a campus already immersed in the issue of sexual assault; the school has been under a federal civil-rights investigation for its handling of such cases since 2011. And the legacy of a U-Va. senior beaten to death by her ex-boyfriend five years earlier has advocates committed to working to prevent violence.

Some students told Kaine that they had never learned about topics such as consent, communication in relationships and preventing dating violence before college, and that they thought it would be helpful if public schools’ health curriculum included it.

Kaine and McCaskill’s Teach Safe Relationships Act would require public schools to broaden health education to delve into such topics.

How, and whether, relationships and sex are taught in public schools is often divisive, with critics questioning federal mandates and saying parents should decide what children are taught.

U-Va.’s One Less sexual-assault prevention group praised the bill in a statement: “As advocates and educators, one of the biggest challenges we face is undoing years of apathy, misinformation, and cultural norms. The statistics show us that 44% of survivors are assaulted before the age of eighteen. However, education on consent and healthy relationships is all but non-existent in our public education system.”

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