PSS concerned about students sexual behavior

The Public School System is calling on the community, especially parents and guardians, to check on their children’s “at risk behaviors” including sexual practices to ensure their healthy well-being and prevent them from getting any sexually-transmitted disease.

“This is everyone’s responsibility. These are all our children. We need to be aware of their sexual orientation and how to effectively address their concerns,” said PSS science program coordinator Jackie Quitugua.

Quitugua, who presented a comparison of latest data on the CNMI Youth Risk behavioral survey during a juvenile annual conference last week, said it is also important that the young people achieve “cultural competence.”

“They should be confident of who they are, where they are from. A confidence about their roots,” she said.

She said cultural awareness would help them be firm and not easily swayed when pressures arise.

Quitugua said that there is some improvement in the youth’s sexual behaviors in 2003 data compared with 2001.

But she said there remains a big concern when it comes to the high school level.

“We’re most concerned about the high school,” said Quitugua. She did not elaborate.

Recent PSS surveys showed that more teenagers in the CNMI are engaging in sex.

The PSS’ Selected Results from the 2001 CNMI High School Youth Risk Behavior Survey showed that 50.9 percent of the students have had sexual intercourse, and that 34.5 percent had it with one or more people.

Among high school students, 8.5 percent of respondents had sexual intercourse before the age 13, while some (5.1 percent) middle school respondents said they first had sex before 11 years old.

Meantime, 40.2 percent of those who had sexual intercourse in high school and 41.5 percent in middle school said they used condom.

In Quitugua’s presentation last week, she said that of the total respondents in 2001, 19.1 percent had had sexual intercourse, 6.5 percent had four or more sex partners, 5. 1 percent had sex before age 11, and 41.5 percent had used condom in their last sexual intercourse.

There were 1,277 PSS middle school students and 1,335 high school students surveyed in 2001.

In 2003, the percentage of students who had sex was reduced to 15.8 percent, those with four or more partners, 3.8 percent; had sex before 11, 4.2 percent; and those who used condom, 53.6 percent.

There were more respondents in the 2003 survey: 1,543 from middle school and 2,177 from high school.