SEN. Sherwin Gatchalian yesterday called for the total scrapping of the Comprehensive Sexuality Education (CSE) in the school curriculum.
Gatchalian said the CSE is “not the intention” of the Responsible Parenthood and Reproductive Health (RPRH) Act of 2012 on which the program was anchored.
“My recommendation is to scrap the CSE. Go back to the original intention of the (RP) RH Law, which is RH (reproductive health) education,” Gatchalian said in a virtual press conference.
He said he had a “fruitful talk” with Education Secretary Juan Edgardo Angara this week but declined to give details about their meeting so as not to preempt the department’s decision on his recommendation.
He said Sen. Pia Cayeteno, principal author and sponsor of the RPRH Act, was also in attendance during his talk with Angara.
“Anyway, the DepEd said that its legal basis for the CSE is the RH Law. What happened was it morphed from sex education to sexuality education which is not the intent of the RH Law,” he said, adding that even Cayteno affirmed that the intent of the law was to teach reproductive health, not sexuality education.
He said the DepEd will just have to revoke Department Order No. 31 series of 2018 and replace it with a new directive which will focus on RH Education.
He added that it will not be hard for teachers to implement reproductive health education since most of them were trained on sex education.
Gatchalian earlier called for the temporary suspension of CSE in the school curriculum due to “confusion” on the wordings in DO 31 series of 2018. He also noted the inconsistencies in CSE, which will be taught in all levels of learning, while the RPRH Law provides that it will only be taught to adolescents, or those from 10 to 19 years old.
DepEd Undersecretary Filemon Ray Javier said that DO 31 is under review, even as he assured that revisions will be made “if necessary” so that CSE will be properly implemented.