RALEIGH, N.C.  – North Carolina lawmakers have proposed giving parents a third choice in how public schools teach adolescents about sex – allowing them to opt of the curriculum.

The House Health Committee on Tuesday approved legislation that would expand sex education beyond the abstinence-until-marriage focus, which has been the center of the curriculum since the mid-1990s.

The bill would allow parents to decide whether their children also learned about contraception in grades seven through nine.

The committee decided Tuesday to give parents a third choice – no sex education for their child. Children whose parents make no choice would be taught under the contraception curriculum.

The measure next heads to a vote by the full state House.