Did you know? The fight to get condoms as a Hope student

If you are a sexually active student at Hope College and want to practice safe sex, you have four options:

1. Go to a store nearby and buy some condoms.

2. Go to Holland’s health center and get some for free.

3. Go to the nearest Planned Parenthood in Wyoming, 30 minutes away, and get some for free.

4. Go to the Hope College Health Center and use your once-a-semester STD screening appointment to get tested, talk with a doctor about sex and then you may ask for condoms, in which case they will hand you a small pack of three to five condoms.

That’s right. These are the options at hand, and if you are broke and/or don’t have a car, the Health Center is within walking distance!

Are you a senior wondering why you have never heard about this before? Don’t feel too bad about it; this is only something that has been happening since the middle of this semester. Hope’s Human Sexuality statement does not allow the Health Center to advertise they have condoms because it is not biblical to have sex before marriage. Instead, Hope wants to encourage students to be celibate and wait.

However, this is not an opinion that some students share, so don’t let it shed a negative light on your views of the campus. In fact, in a survey of over 100 Hope students, it was found that they do want free condoms in the Health Center.

One anonymous student said, “I like sex, and condoms are nice to have but awkward to buy. All the other schools pass them out; why can’t we?”

Another said, “Students at Hope are having sex. There’s nothing we can do to change that. That being said, we need to provide a way for them to have sex safely.”

If you are a student who thinks that the college shouldn’t pay for condoms, or that sex is a choice and so you should obtain your own condoms without college help, then options 1-3 would probably be a better fit for you.

So remember, Hope College does care about your health and well being as long as it doesn’t interfere with their outdated values.

On a more serious note, if you have any questions about the history of condoms at Hope College or if you need contact information for places in the area to get condoms, contact bonnie.gregory@hope.edu.