GAINESILLE, Fla. – Alachua County Public Schools Superintendent Owen Roberts doesn’t think it’s the school district’s responsibility to distribute condoms to students, so he banned the practice.

The move is designed to ensure the district doesn’t undermine parents’ responsibility to talk with their children about safe sex, Roberts told the Gainesville Sun, but critics contend removing free condoms from schools could hamper efforts to reduce the high rate of sexually transmitted diseases among teens.

The district didn’t have a formal policy regarding condoms prior to the decision, but a group of students and sexual education advocates are now working to pressure officials to reverse course.

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Florida education statutes require schools to teach abstinence, but Alachua County’s Health Services Handbook states “It is important that students feel comfortable approaching their school nurse for human sexuality education, STD treatment or prevention, teen pregnancy and the prevention of such,” according to the news site.

“No one came and said ‘do it,’ and no one came and said ‘don’t do it’ until recently,” district health services supervisor Pat Hughes said of nurses distributing condoms in Alachua County schools.

In the past, nurses at some high schools handed out brown paper bags with condoms and information on safe sex to students who requested it.

“It’s a method of teaching, not just standing there and handing them out,” Hughes said.

The decision to ban condoms distribution comes as Gainesville High School senior Kira Christmas works to convince district officials they should ensure students in all of the district’s high schools have access to contraceptives.

“Condoms are a safety tool,” Christmas told WCJB. “It’s something that everybody needs in life. It’s 2015 and it shouldn’t be an issue.”

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Christmas met with Roberts about her proposal, but he didn’t seem receptive to her idea, The Daily Caller reports.

“She said the superintendent’s message was that he is uncertain if the free-condom proposal has broad support in the community,” according to the news site.

Christmas told the Sun that the student group PAUSE 4 Teens, of which she is the president, has collected nearly 300 signatures in support of condoms in schools. More than 700 people between the ages of 15 and 19 contracted chlamydia or gonorrhea in 2012, based on Florida Department of Health data.

The Guttmacher Institute, which tracks sexual health, contends that 70 percent of teens engage in sex before they turn 19 years old, according to the Sun.

“These numbers represent people,” Christmas told the Sun. “These people shouldn’t be getting completely preventable diseases.”

PAUSE is now working with local health professionals to distribute sex education materials to students on campus, and direct them to places that provide free condoms off campus, the Sun reports.

Regardless, many parents to commented on the condom ban online support the school district.

“Thank you, Mr. Roberts,” Deb Ferguson posted to Facebook.

“I used to work as a school nurse and never gave out condoms,” Annette Armstrong wrote. “I believe it is the parents’ job to teach their children about sex and if needed, provide their child birth control.

“Too many people think the school system should be raising, feeding and clothing their child on top of education. Good God people! You had ‘em, you raise ‘em.”