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North Carolina schools would offer families a choice of two sex-education curriculums under a bill the House tentatively approved Wednesday, including one backers say would be more comprehensive than the current standard.

Most students now receive a course that emphasizes abstinence until marriage; the comprehensive course would explore sexual topics more broadly.

Under the bill, families could also choose to have students attend neither course, which would be offered in seventh through ninth grades.

The measure passed 64-53 and faces a second House vote today before being sent to the Senate. It had become a flashpoint between social conservatives, who argued that the proposed comprehensive curriculum would erode emphasis on traditional marriage, and backers of the bill, who said children needed more information to prevent disease and unwanted pregnancies.

“We’re teaching in most of our school systems abstinence, but abstinence is not what most students are doing,” said Rep. Alma Adams, a Greensboro Democrat.

Adams and other proponents pointed to statistics showing North Carolina has one of the highest teen pregnancy rates in the country and that thousands of the state’s teens contract STDs every year. According to CDC surveys, roughly a third of high school students report they have had sex by the end of grade nine.

Opponents of the measure argued that the current abstinence-until-marriage curriculum offered by most North Carolina school systems, including Guilford County, already covers much of what the comprehensive curriculum would offer.

And they say that despite comparisons to other states, North Carolina’s teen pregnancy rate has dropped during its use.

“Could you give me an example of one vital piece of information that this new curriculum gives our children that the existing curriculum does not,” Rep. Bryan Holloway, a Stokes County Republican who represents parts of Randolph, asked Rep. Bob England, a Rutherford County Democrat and the bill’s primary author.

England acknowledged that the current curriculum did teach about certain forms of contraception, but he said it stressed the failure rates of condoms and the like. He and other proponents said the comprehensive curriculum offered an approach more consistent with what students are encountering.

“Comprehensive sex education is based on biology, not some ideological, political agenda,” said Rep. Earl Jones, who spoke in favor of the bill and against amendments that he said weakened it.

One such amendment, offered by Rep. Bruce Goforth of Buncombe County, removed language that would have called for teaching respect for “long-term, committed relationships” in addition to marriage.

Conservative groups had railed against that language as opening the door to teaching about homosexuality or that having multiple spouses was acceptable. Backers of the bill said removing the language would make the measure less controversial.

“I’m a little curious about your amendment,” Rep. Jennifer Weiss of Wake County said. “Did you know your wife before you married her?”

Goforth paused, then said, “I think that’s a personal question and I don’t think —”

Weiss shot back, “I did not mean in the biblical sense,” as others on the House floor laughed.

“I did know my wife before I married her; I didn’t get her off the Internet or anything,” Goforth said.

Weiss argued that most people are involved in relationships with potential spouses before marriage. And she added that people in their 20s were waiting for years to marry while still involved with the same person.

Even with Goforth’s amendment to the bill, opponents argued that students could be taught too much under a comprehensive curriculum.

Rep. Paul Stam, a Wake County Republican and his party’s leader in the House, and Rep. John Blust referred to materials from one comprehensive curriculum that outlined anal intercourse and mutual masturbation as potential topics.

“I’m asking what information parents will be given as to the details of the proposed curriculum,” Blust said. “Reading these guidelines of what we’ve called euphemistically abstinence-based comprehensive — some of these particulars do not appear appropriate. We cannot even read them on the floor (of the House) probably without being gaveled down.”

Backers of the measure said that parents would be able to review “any and all” material used in the sex education classes before allowing their children to attend.

Contact Mark Binker at (919) 832-5549 or mark.binker@news-record.com