Public Comment period now open until August 3 at 11:59

In keeping with Governor Youngkin’s promise to restore parents’ rights in the education of their children, the General Assembly passed and he signed into law a bill requiring that parents receive notification of sexually explicit instructional material in schools.

The new law requires the Virginia Department of Education to develop model policies regarding sexually explicit content and to make such policies available to each school board in the Commonwealth.

On July 4, the Department issued Draft Model Policies for public comment. The public comment period will end at 11:59 PM on Wednesday, August 3. A link to the document and comment section are provided below.

The Model Policies cover: 1) Ensuring parental notification, 2) Identifying specific instructional material and sexually explicit subjects, and 3) Permitting the parent of any student to review instructional material that includes sexually explicit content and provide, as an alternative, nonexplicit instructional material and related academic activities to any student whose parent so requests.

The draft document is comprehensive, straightforward and thoughtfully written. Once implemented, the model policies should provide needed guidance to educators and reaffirm a parent’s “fundamental right” under Virginia statute “to make decisions concerning the upbringing, education, and care of the parent’s child.”

Click to go to the Virginia Regulatory Town Hall website here, where you’ll find a link to the Proposed Document (upper right hand side of the screen) and a link to where you can View and Enter Comments (lower lefthand side of the screen).