P.S. Weekly airs on Thursdays this spring. Subscribe wherever you get podcasts.

Episodes republish Mondays in the Miseducation feed.

Are New York City students getting the sex education they need? P.S. Weekly’s episode 2 explores the systemic shortcomings and urgent need for comprehensive — and inclusive — sex education in New York City schools.

Producers Aponi Kafele, a junior at Manhattan’s Essex Street Academy, and Sanaa Stokes, a senior at Manhattan’s Professional Performing Arts High School, expose the patchwork approach to sex education across schools, from anatomy lessons using gingerbread men to teachers who aren’t trained in the subject.

The information gaps are especially concerning for LGBTQ+ youth. One student, who is a member of the LGBTQ+ community, wishes his school offered sex ed where he could ask more questions and get more advice. “I think it's important for sex ed to normalize sex, especially for people our age,” he told Sanaa. “So we don't carry on these fears into our adulthood.”

And Aliyah Ansari, a teen health strategist from the New York Civil Liberties Union, explains why her organization is pushing for change, calling on the state to require K-12 comprehensive sexuality education in public and charter schools that would be age and culturally appropriate and medically accurate and inclusive. 

“We see time and time again,” Ansari said, “our students are not getting the information that they need.”

P.S. Weekly is available on major podcast platforms, including Apple Podcasts and Spotify. Reach us at [email protected].

P.S. Weekly is a collaboration between Chalkbeat and The Bell, made possible by generous support from The Pinkerton Foundation.

Miseducation is a podcast of The Bell that equips New York City public high school students with the tools to report on inequities in the nation’s largest school system.