School District Partners With Qpid.me to Teach Sex Ed; Students Share HIV/STD Statuses Via Text Message

Students in the Los Angeles Unified School District are getting a dose of reality when it comes to sexual health.

According to CNN reports, the school district partnered this past fall with the website Qpid.me that allows kids as young as 13 to find an STD clinic, get tested and have their results sent to them via text message.

The goal of the school district's partnership is to "teach students as young as seventh grade how to get their STD results, show them to potential partners, and then request to see their potential partners' results before they hook up or have sex."

The district turned to Qpid.me to try a new way to get students tested and reduce infections.

CNN reported 200,000 ninth- through 12th-graders and 120,000 seventh- and eighth-graders have learned about the free service in fall and spring semester health classes.

Skeptics of the program say the website borders the line of condoning underage sex and gives an incomplete a partner's STD status. Critics also question whether students would be organized enough to get themselves to clinics or be mature enough to actually use the information before having sex.

Tim Kordic, the school district's HIV/AIDS prevention program manager, disagree with critics skepticism about Qpid.me.

"We're not using this as a lure for kids to say, 'OK, you can have sex because you did this,'" Kordic told CNN. "What we felt was that if the kids had the information that they would make better decisions about their sexual partners."

Leslie Kantor, Planned Parenthood's vice president of education, also expressed concerns about teens using the website as a tool.

"While [Planned Parenthood values] the use of innovative tools to improve sexual health, the most powerful message we can deliver to prevent infections is to always use a condom every time you have sex," Kantor told CNN.

Reportedly, the school district says it is too soon to tell how many students are actively or the effectiveness of using Qpid.me. The district told CNN that it "recognizes parents may be uncomfortable with their children using technology to text and share their STD status, but notes its tech-savvy students have a different perspective."