The Nation - News from Oct. 25, 1987

The New York state Board of Regents approved a controversial teachers manual that recommends teaching the use of condoms as a means of avoiding AIDS. While the guidebook stresses abstinence, it recommends that sexually active students be taught how to use condoms, starting in the seventh grade. The vote was criticized by state Sen. James Donovan, chairman of the state Senate Education Committee, who vowed to introduce legislation to block the teaching of condom use. Some regents argued that such a manual would encourage premarital sex, but others said it was wrong to think that schoolchildren were not already sexually active and that it would be irresponsible to withhold potentially life-saving information.