MEMBER FOCUS: Hunter Wagenaar
Hunter Wagenaar, Founder & CEO of IDEA
“WE HAD ONE PANDEMIC but we are about to face an epidemic of sexually transmitted disease,” says Hunter Wagenaar, a fourth year University of Virginia student, Founder & CEO of Inclusive Developmental Education for Adolescents (IDEA) and Common House Cville member. During this past year of distance learning, sexual education—which historically has been a tertiary part of academic curriculum—has taken a further backseat. Currently, only 24 states and the District of Columbia mandate sex ed in schools. Even within these municipalities, antiquated views of abstinence-only and heteronormative teachings are prevalent (only ten states teach LGBTQ-inclusive sexual health). Through his company’s educational offerings, Hunter and his team are at the forefront of changing discourse around sexuality and sexual wellbeing.
“Most kids get their sexual education right now from either peers, porn, or dating apps. All these options are going to have misinformation. Or they are not going to be realistic conceptions of intimacy and sexuality,” Hunter states. “You can’t really control those factors but you can control a good health education.” Motivated to create systemic change on both the advocacy and policy levels, he launched his startup IDEA in 2018. When Hunter first started, IDEA centered on LGBTQ health. Now, he and his team are developing a broad library of content, in which students will be able to select from such topics as body image and nutrition, in addition to consent, STI prevention, and human anatomy. His goal is to provide medically-accurate information that is as inclusive and diverse as it is comprehensive and standardized.
The idea behind IDEA is simple. Students log onto their portal and select a given topic. They then take a pre-test, watch a 10–12-minute video, and take a post-test. Parents or educators are also given a companion video, which helps keep the conversation going to ensure that students retain the information. As Hunter notes, “One of the biggest roadblocks in our current system is a lack of focus on knowledge retention. You can give kids a video but if they don’t remember 75% of what was just said, how can they use it in their daily lives?” He notes that with subjects such as math, there are standardized tests, which measure knowledge acquisition and retention. As of now though, there is no SOL equivalent for sexual health within school systems, meaning that a teenager in Virginia receives a much different education that a teenager living in California or Texas. That is something that Hunter aims to reform.
COVID accelerated his plans, as he realized that there is a pressing need for teens to receive this information. “Every minute, there are 20 new STD transmissions just among adolescents aged 18 to 24. Over the last five years, we’ve continuously reached an all-time high of transmissions,” Hunter states. Thus, he and his team got to work, developed a working prototype to show parents, and received rave reviews. Although parents are his current target audience, Hunter hopes that IDEA’s web-based videos will be eventually implemented on a larger scale in both private and public schools. As someone who is working toward his accelerated Master’s degree in Public Policy, he knows fully well that focusing on social entrepreneurship (creating the tools for sexual health education) as well as policy implementation (having the ability and support to distribute information) is critical in order to make a lasting impact.
Hunter credits his Board of Advisors and Board of Educators who have provided him with invaluable counsel in making his prototype a reality. Among the brilliant minds who sits on his boards is Dr. Lisa Speidel—an Assistant Professor of Women, Gender, and Sexuality at the University of Virginia. Starting at 6:30pm on May 18, Hunter and Lisa are joining forces to present on Sexual Miseducation over Zoom. “We’re going to talk about the historical roots of sex education in America, with a focus on harmful impacts of our system, which is currently fraught with misinformation, fear-based approaches, and medically inaccurate content,” Hunter states. He then goes on to mention that much like IDEA’s logo (a light bulb), his purpose in discussing sexuality and sexual education is to simply shine light on what is often kept in the dark. Together, he and Lisa want to empower people to reexamine how we view and talk about sex ed, so that we—and upcoming generations— have a brighter and healthier future.
*Check out details or RSVP for Hunter and Lisa’s virtual event, Sexual Miseducation, which will be held May 18 from 6:30-8pm. Free for members and guests.