RESPECT U: Sexual Risk Avoidance Education for Youth in Limestone, Madison, Marshall, and Morgan Counties, Alabama - Huntsville Pregnancy Resource Center (HPRC), a nonprofit serving North Alabama since 1981, requests three years of GD-SRAE funding to deliver the RESPECTU Sexual Risk Avoidance Education program to youth ages 10-19 across a contiguous four-county service region: Limestone, Madison, Marshall, and Morgan Counties. These counties report teen birth rates above the national average: Marshall at 42 and Morgan at 30 per 1,000 women ages 15-19, against a national rate of 13.1, and elevated sexually transmitted infection rates, with Morgan County at 848.6 and Madison County at 628.4 per 100,000. Youth in the region also face documented threats including online sexual exploitation, trafficking, and cyberbullying. A new Alabama law (SB209), effective October 1, 2026, requires public-school sex education to teach sexual risk avoidance and encourage abstinence from nonmarital sexual activity, creating immediate demand for trained, certified providers. RESPECTU SRAE meets this need by delivering evidence-based, medically accurate, age-appropriate sexual risk avoidance education that normalizes avoiding nonmarital sexual activity as the optimal health behavior. Instruction is organized in three grade-banded tiers using the Decisions, Choices & Options (DCO) curricula: Healthy Boundaries (grades 7-8), Life Choices paired with REAL Essentials Advance (grades 9-10), and Cost of Parenting (grades 11-12) reinforced by the Success Sequence, positive youth development, healthy-relationship and refusal skills, trauma-informed practice, and the A21 human-trafficking prevention curriculum. Program materials are available in English and Spanish. Over the three-year period, RESPECTU SRAE will provide direct classroom instruction to an estimated 19,192 students across a minimum of 30 schools and will engage more than 500 parents and community members, extending programming to youth ages 10-19 through community-agency partners. The project is delivered by certified Sexual Risk Avoidance Specialists and supported by established partnerships with area school districts, the Women's Resource Center (Athens), Real Life Pregnancy Center (Albertville), Lincoln Village Ministry, YoungLives, and the Zeta Omicron Chapter of Iota Phi Lambda Sorority, Inc. An independent evaluator, Evans Evaluation, supports collection and reporting of all OMB-approved SRAE performance measures using matched entry and exit surveys, with fidelity monitoring and continuous quality improvement throughout. The project reaches priority populations including youth with foster-care experience and pregnant or parenting youth in alignment with ACF's A Home for Every Child initiative, and advances ACF priorities in Promoting Work and Self-Sufficiency, Promoting Marriage and Family Formation, Gold-Standard Research, and Ensuring Value Alignment in Funding. RESPECTU SRAE equips the region's youth with the knowledge, skills, and future orientation to avoid sexual risk and pursue healthy, self-sufficient, and successful lives.
