The current Texas Monthly features an extensive investigation by Katy Vine into the success of the state’s sex-education program. Some of its key findings include the startling revelations that: 1. The current Texas Monthly features an extensive investigation by Katy Vine into the success of the state’s sex-education program. Some of its key findings include the startling revelations that: 2. The Texas Education Code, written by the state legislature, requires that classrooms give more attention to abstinence than any other approach and that they must present abstinence as the only method that is 100 percent effective at preventing pregnancy, sexually transmitted infections, HIV/AIDS, and the “emotional trauma associated with adolescent sexual activity.” 3. No law mandates that methods of contraception be included in sex ed classes, and condom instruction is not encouraged anywhere in the code. 4. Only one of the four state-approved high school student health textbooks uses the word “condom,” and that book reaches only a small percentage of the Texas market.5. In the entire state we found two people that were involved in these programs that had degrees in health education,” Texas A&M researcher, B. E. “Buzz” Pruitt said. “Two of the curricula didn’t contain a single fact.”. This lack of sex education is certainly taking a toll: Texas ranks number one in teenage births, costing taxpayers there over $1 billion a year. And 24 percent of those births are not the girl’s first delivery. The rate of teenage births in Texas is decreasing at a slower rate than the nation at large. Texan teenagers say they are having sex at a higher rate than the national average (52.5 percent vs. 47 percent). Support this podcast: https://podcasters.spotify.com/pod/show/sandy-cross/support