There's no debate that good decision-making comes from understanding every operation available. The selection of one choice over another is made from careful calculation of truth and consequence.

So when it comes to teaching children sex education in our nations' schools, the format should come nothing short of an objective history lesson - just the facts.

The minds of the young and impressionable are the ones we worry the most about. Because of this, the teaching of abstinence as a school's sole form of sex education cannot be condoned. It's neither reasonable nor practical.

Regardless of their sex-education backgrounds, 75 percent of MSU students are sexually active, with 70 percent of them having been active before coming to college. The fact that few of those students are married is a testament that the presence of abstinence education had minimal or no affect on them, if they received it.

It's atrocious that the U.S. House of Representatives would find that 80 percent of federally funded abstinence-only curricula contained false, misleading or distorted information. Such information professed ideas as radical as STDs being spread by sweat and tears and gross generalizations of the roles of men and women. These programs have used false information to make students terrified of having sex.

Even worse, schools seeking federal funds for education programs have no alternative. They are limited to teaching the abstinence-only format to receive funding.

Young minds are made for enriching, not programing with lies. This method of misinformation - still being pushed to receive significant funding from President Bush - seems a lot like Big Brother brainwashing.

That said, open-handed passing out of condoms to kids isn't a great solution, either. The gray area of this issue comes out of how much to educate, and when. Understanding one's body and its changes is something that needs to be explained as a child comes into maturity.

This progression in teaching should begin to incorporate sex education some time in high school. The certainty of abstinence preventing disease and pregnancy should be heavily incorporated into the program. Sex should be a discouraged choice. For many, it is a powerful and intense experience with ramifications far beyond the capacity of comprehension of students in secondary school.

Another point to consider is the need for education to begin and be supplemented in the home. A child shouldn't be sat down for his or her first talk about the birds and bees in a public school. Parents need to be the first educators and continue by taking part in deciding the content of the programs their children will be taught in school. It's especially important for them to play a role if their child is in a school where the only form of sex education is abstinence-based.

The bottom line: Ignorance is not bliss, and unplanned pregnancies happen when children are left to be taught about sex through raunchy MTV music videos. It's ignorant to think that a child growing up in this day and age isn't going to find options besides abstinence for themselves. The choice is up to our nation's schools and parents to decide if they want to be the first providing reasonable information.