The Office of Superintendent of Public Instruction has said public school districts would be able to choose from a variety of full sex ed curricula and supplemental curricula for grades K-5, grades 6-8, and high schoolers, respectively. According to Seattle Weekly, the office said that grades K-3 curricula focus on social-emotional learning.
The state superintendent's office said it is appropriate for fourth-graders to learn how to define sexual orientation and gender identity. Later grades would learn about healthy relationships, consent, developmental growth, the functions of reproductive systems, how to prevent unwanted pregnancies and STDs. They are also supposed to understand the influences of family, peers, community and the media on healthy sexual relationships.
But Washington's bishops disagreed.
The state's Catholic conference argued that "locally elected school boards cannot fully determine their own policy in this sensitive area." It explained that although school districts are permitted to create their own curriculum based on the state's 2005 health standards, the sex education mandate is not funded and so school districts are more likely to rely on the existing state curriculum than to create their own without funds.
The Catholic conference warned that such sex education can have an effect on the school's general atmosphere.
"Parents can opt their children out of classroom instruction, but they cannot opt them out of schoolyard discussions and the culture change that may take place at school as the result of (comprehensive sexual health education)," it warned.
