Guidelines on Health Curriculum Attacked : Schools: Critics tell state board hearing that the proposal promotes homosexuality and sexual activity. Plan is sent back to a commission with a list of suggested changes.

SACRAMENTO — A parade of witnesses told a crowded State Board of Education hearing Monday that proposed new curriculum guidelines for health education promote homosexuality and also encourage students to be sexually active.

Critics also attacked the guidelines for favoring school-based health clinics and for urging teachers to encourage students’ self-esteem and to teach stress-management techniques.

The new curriculum approach was defended by the California Parent-Teacher Assn., the state association of health educators and by many speakers who identified themselves as gay or lesbian or as parents of gay or lesbian children.

The curriculum guidelines are important because they serve as the basis for courses to be taught in the state’s 1,000 school districts and for textbooks that the board will select later.

Although the health framework document is 103 pages, and deals with many subjects, much testimony centered on a few sentences that discuss different kinds of families that exist in the United States.

“The traditional family, with two married parents and one or more children, is one model,” the framework states. “Others that are part of contemporary society include blended families and families headed by grandparents, siblings, relatives, friends, foster parents and parents of the same sex.”

David Llewelyn, director of the Western Center for Law and Religious Freedom, in Sacramento, objected that this language “treats the traditional family as the equal of these other kinds of families,” instead of praising traditional families as the models to be emulated.

The Rev. Louis P. Sheldon, president of the Traditional Values Coalition, said the proposed framework documents “attempts to advocate and promote homosexuality as an acceptable and healthy lifestyle.”

In an interview, Sheldon added: “This is recruitment par excellence. It is saying, hey, guys, same sex is viable, same sex is meaningful. But parents don’t want that taught.”

On the other side of the argument, Stanley Olsen, who described himself as a retired Lutheran bishop with “four heterosexual daughters,” praised the guidelines because “their goal is pro-family and pro-good education.”

After listening to several hours of testimony, punctuated by occasional cheers and catcalls, the board sent the guidelines back to the state Curriculum Commission with a list of suggested changes in structure and content.

Although the nature of the changes was not disclosed, this action was treated as a victory by those who oppose the framework in its present form and as a defeat for its supporters.

“That’s a bad omen,” said Mike Hudson, vice president of People for the American Way, a liberal constitutional rights organization. “The Curriculum Commission heard all this testimony before and decided not to make any changes. This is a real slap in the face for (state Supt. of Public Instruction Bill) Honig, his staff and the commission.”

Many speakers told of personal tragedies, perhaps none more moving than Mary Griffith, representing a group called Parents and Friends of Lesbian and Gay People.

Griffith said her homosexual son was afraid to admit his sexual preference, dropped out of high school and killed himself by leaping from a freeway overpass.

“To remain silent is to blatantly ignore suicide and mental health risks,” she told the board members in urging them to retain the sections of the framework that discuss homosexuality.

But Llewelyn said gays and lesbians who commit suicide do so because of “personal guilt.”

Although the guidelines say that “abstinence is presented as the only 100% effective way to stop sexually transmitted diseases,” it also urges full discussion of these diseases, including AIDS, at appropriate grade levels.

This complies with requirements of state law.