Should middle school health clinics provide birth control pills to students?

The health clinic at a Maine middle school caused an uproar by planning to prescribe and distribute the birth control pill to students who request it. Although students need parental permission to use the clinic, the treatment they receive is confidential under state law.

Some parents are outraged that their children could obtain birth control pills (as well as condoms) without their knowledge and want the plan revoked. Proponents of the program insist that sex among middle schoolers is a reality and that schools have an obligation to provide counseling, contraception, and privacy to those students who seek it. But are schools within their rights to hand out birth control? Tell us what you think.