Scarleteen

An organization offering progressive, inclusive and independent sex & relationship education & support centering teenagers and emerging adults! We cover safer sex, LGBTQIA issues, birth control, relationships, and more. It's dedicated to providing truly comprehensive and highly inclusive sex and relationships education, information and support that centers young people.

Services provided:

• Online text-based content: Scarleteen contains thousands of original, comprehensive, and accurate sexuality, health and relationship⁠ articles, guides, factsheets and advice answers, based on the expressed needs of young people themselves and all available at no cost. Our widely inclusive, expansive content is thoughtfully written and edited by adult, emerging adult or teen writers, and regularly fact-checked and updated as needed with current, medically-accurate information.
• Direct Services: Our message boards, live chat, text/SMS line and our reddit offer young people the ability to talk directly with one of our staff and members of our community at no cost to them. Our direct services are actively moderated to provide a safe, comfortable space and accurate, compassionately delivered information, staffed by our staff and trained peer volunteers. Our direct services are used for an array of questions and answers, long discussions, emotional support, help finding in-person care or other resources, and, in the services that are community based, to engage in safe, respectful peer-to-peer discussion. Our direct service interactions primarily inform our static content and outreach.
• Outside resource referrals: We frequently help our users find outside sexual⁠/reproductive healthcare services, mental healthcare, LGBTQIA+ support, local children and family services, sexual abuse⁠ and other crisis care, books, other websites, community centers and other resources. Staff can also be available to users to make screening/intake phone calls if they feel nervous about first calling themselves or if they are not sure a service is bonafide.
• Other outreach: We provide offline teen outreach education, support and training to other organizations and groups, primarily through or at sexual/reproductive health clinics, community and school groups and teen homeless/transitional shelters. We have provided additional outreach, training and education at colleges, universities, schools, community centers and conferences, to students, parents and to fellow teen and sexual health workers and educators. Scarleteen also frequently provides expert information for articles, books, podcasts, studies and other media about topics like teen, emerging adult and general sexuality, sexual health, relationships, queer⁠ sexuality and gender identity⁠, parenting, and sex⁠ education. You can see some of where we have appeared in media over the years here.
• Mentoring and leadership: Scarleteen provides active, engaged mentorship and guidance for our volunteers and interns, and participates in and supports youth leadership events and initiatives outside the organization. Scarleteen is long considered by many to be a highly influential leader in progressive and inclusive sexuality education, and we have directly participated in and supported activism to influence and change public policy, like teaming up with the ACLU to fight the COPA.