(1) Beginning no later than the 2025-26 school year, school districts must offer instruction in sex trafficking awareness and prevention. The instruction may be offered beginning in grade seven, but each student must be offered the instruction at least once before completing grade 12. The instruction, at the discretion of the school or school district, may be integrated into a relevant course or a course may be repurposed to include the instruction. (2) Subject to the availability of amounts appropriated for this specific purpose, on or before June 30, 2024, the office of the superintendent of public instruction must review curricula related to the awareness and prevention of sex trafficking. (3) To the extent practicable, the office of the superintendent of public instruction must make available in the library of openly licensed courseware under RCW 28A.300.803, curricular resources related to the awareness and prevention of sex trafficking that include: (a) Information about the race, gender, and socioeconomic status of sex trafficking victims and perpetrators; (b) Medically and legally accurate definitions of sex trafficking, and information about term stigmatization and how it may reduce reporting and increase the difficulty of detecting and prosecuting sex trafficking crimes; (c) Information about reporting systems and community engagement opportunities with local, state, or national organizations against sex trafficking, and basic identification training to determine if an individual is at risk of or has been sex trafficked; and (d) Information to help students recognize the signs and behavior changes in others that may indicate grooming for sex trafficking or other unlawful, coercive relationships. (4) This section governs school operation and management under RCW 28A.710.040 and 28A.715.020, and applies to charter schools established under chapter 28A.710 RCW and state-tribal education compact schools established under chapter 28A.715 RCW to the same extent as it applies to school districts. [ 2023 c 328 s 2.]
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