By Ryan Hershey
Student Reporter
Students at Amarillo College are expanding their minds about sex and learning more about their own bodies thanks to “The Hook Up,” a weeklong affair on campus focusing on sexual health and education. The Hook Up ran from Feb. 14-Feb. 17, 2022, and featured several presentations and activities.
The hosting of such an event by the Amarillo College Student Life department is an attempt to provide students with the kind of education that is largely lacking throughout their teen years leading up to college.
“I think it’s great,” Thomas Scott Mcclain, a business management and marketing major, said. “I mean it’s information they don’t teach you in high school, that’s for sure. And it’s frowned upon through younger education, so it’s definitely needed and it’s helpful.”
Indeed, many of the topics discussed throughout the weeklong event covered personal responsibility in regard to having safe sex along with valuable insights into the many possible repercussions one could face when approaching sex recklessly.
“I feel like the talks were necessary,” Drew Doan, a nursing major, said. “Because we’re in college, sex is inevitable. We’re gonna do it as human beings, but people take it as a joke. I think it’s important to learn about things like that because you can’t get rid of gonorrhea. You can’t get rid of chlamydia. That’s with you forever.”
The risks of sexually-transmitted diseases notwithstanding, students of all backgrounds were able to learn more about the other significant risk involved in unsafe sex practices; that risk being an unplanned pregnancy.
“I learned a lot,” Mcclain said. “I learned a lot about birth control. Specifically, the true meanings and uses for birth control.”
Aside from male students getting the chance to learn more about the history and importance of birth control, female students received knowledge about some of the alternatives to birth control and condoms for men.
“I know what a female condom looks like now and how it’s used,” Doan said. “I had never seen one before.”
Along with learning about the biological aspects of sex and how to protect themselves and their sexual partners, students also had the privilege of hearing from and participating in a Q&A with a highly educated relationships expert.
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