WISE is a national initiative that supports schools in implementing quality, sex education in order to prepare our nation's youth for life-long health and wellbeing.
Each WISE partner works directly with school staff using the WISE Method to create a sustainable, sex education program that's tailored to the needs of schools and the students they serve.
The WISE Method is a flexible approach based on years of best practice research. It helps schools identify, select and implement a curriculum of their choosing, then establish the necessary supports (e.g. policies, community support, staff training, and funding) to maintain a sex education program over time.
Once this has been achieved in a school setting, sex education has been institutionalized.
WISE's goals are two-fold:
- to support the implementation of sex education; and
- to help expand what we know about implementing sex education by sharing important lessons, successes, challenges and resources.
WISE was launched in 2009 and continues today. Partners in 13 states have participated in WISE.
Led by the Grove Foundation, the WISE Initiative is supported by a collaboration of regional and national funders.
Acknowledgements
The WISE Initiative's outcomes and development of the WISE Toolkit are primarily the result of WISE partners' efforts, and their willingness to share their data, successes, challenges, and resources. WISE has also benefited from the advice and assistance of countless national organizations and advisors, including from among the WISE funding community.