Abstract
This Note argues that parents' fundamental right to direct their children's moral and educational upbringing includes the right to exempt their children from objectionable sex education programs in public schools. Schools usurp parents' fundamental rights when they unilaterally introduce children to topics of human sexuality without parental notice or permission. Alleged violations of these rights merit strict scrutiny review from courts. When parents' objections are confined to discrete, tangible events, parents are constitutionally entitled to exempt their children from objectionable activities. The efficacy of this constitutional relief is more limited, however, when parental objections are pervasive and unassociated with a particular aspect of the school's program or curriculum.
Citation
Emily J. Brown,
When Insiders Become Outsiders: Parental Objections to Public School Sex Education Programs,
59 Duke Law Journal
109-144
(2009)
Available at: https://scholarship.law.duke.edu/dlj/vol59/iss1/3