Lincoln County School Board has said the district will become the latest in Tennessee to consider using LiveAction’s Meet Baby Olivia video in its curriculum to comply with a new state law. The video will be presented to ninth graders in southern Tennessee schools, but parents will have the choice to opt their students out.
The “Baby Olivia Act” requires a curriculum that accurately depicts human growth, development and sexuality using a “high-quality, computer-generated animation or high-definition ultrasound of at least three minutes in duration.” The video must visually depict the “development of the brain, heart, and other vital organs in early fetal development.” The law took effect on April 24, 2024, and since then, school boards across the state have been taking up the issue of life and when it begins.
The bill sponsor, State Senator Janice Bowling, stated to WVLT 8 of Knoxville, “I just think it’s wonderful, it tells the truth. They are getting true information regarding what’s developing in the mothers who help everyone,” . . . “There are grown adults that say ‘oh that doesn’t look like a baby, that’s just a lima bean’. Well no, that’s just not accurate.”
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Not everyone is pleased, however, to have these videos shown to students in Tennessee. “I want them to choose for themselves whether they are ready or not. I will explain the video to them and what it kind of shows then give them the choice if they want to see it or not. I don’t think it should be forced upon a child to watch,” said one parent to WVLT.
Hopefully, the parents will choose to watch as well, and see that there is no inappropriate content in the video, which calculates human development from the moment fertilization (when the new human life comes into existence). When physicians count weeks of pregnancy, they normally add two weeks to the age, dating from the estimation of the last menstrual period. However, the actual life of the new human being begins at fertilization (“conceptional age“). Critics of the video have frequently focused their opposition based on this difference in calculation.
Live Action’s “Meet Baby Olivia” video was approved by a panel of several doctors based on information provided by the Endowment for Human Development (EHD), a “nonprofit organization dedicated to improving health science education and public health.” According to earlier coverage by Live Action News, EHD is committed to “neutrality” and their award-winning content on prenatal human development has also been distributed by National Geographic and endorsed by U.S. science educators.
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