AIDS Prevention film banned by Weber school officials By CHERYL' ARCHIBALD Standard-Examiner staff Although the AIDS prevention film "A Letter From Brian" has been shown in Davis County, Weber County school officials say they have banned it because it contains the word "condom" — a no-no for the schools, according to a state attorney general's opin¬ion. Weber schools superintendent Jay Taggart said he likes the film, but he was advised by State Board of Education attorneys to abide by an attorney general's opinion that says state law for¬bids school instruction about con¬traceptives. "I thought the film was well-produced," Taggart said. "It dis¬cusses the problem of AIDS straightforward. I thought the is¬sue of AIDS was dramatically presented. They told us how AIDS can be spread, what's at risk, who is at risk. It also ex¬plained very carefully how not to get AIDS." But when asked if he'd use the Red Cross-produced film, Taggart said, "No. "The Red Cross is not pushing this film on us. They are offering the film to us to use. We have lots of films to use and we decid¬ed not to use this one," he said, adding the other films used by Weber schools do not discuss condoms. "I think our emphasis is on the use of abstinence and on morality and not on the use of protective devices," Taggart said. In the Davis district, the film was shown last week at Layton High School. School health de¬partment chairman and teacher Carolyn Warner said she heard about the film from Weber State College teachers, who gave it fa-vorable reviews. She asked the American Red Cross' Bonneville chapter in Ogden for a copy of the tape. On Nov. 23, the film was re¬viewed by student-body officers, the school's health department and the assistant principal, said Layton Principal Paul Smith. It was approved and shown in health classes on Tuesday and Wednesday last week. Smith said Warner kept him informed about the film but he did not see it until this week. "It por¬trayed how imminent the threat (of AIDS) is and dispelled many myths and it does it well. It in¬cludes statements from the sur¬geon general," he said. The Davis district's Jim Hill, administrator of health curricu¬lum and a member of the governor's AIDS Advisory Com¬mittee, said individual schools can decide which films and mate¬rials to use without district ap¬proval. "It was brought to my attention that Layton used it. They had some faculty review it and they thought it was OK." Hill said he has not seen the film and cannot comment on it. But, regarding teaching about sex¬ually transmitted diseases such as acquired immune deficiency syn¬drome, he said, "You're damned if you do and you're damned if you don't." In the film, a teenage boy, Bri¬an, contracts AIDS from needles during experimentation with drugs. See FILM on 2A