AIDS education in Seattle schools was patchy in the late 1980s and early 1990s. Health officials knew that better awareness would help slow the spread of the disease, and students were eager for accurate information. But many schools and parents were nervous about in-school discussions of sex and contraception. In 1987 the Seattle-King County Health Department started testing an assembly program that could be presented to all middle and high schools within the Seattle Public School system, and in 1989 Seattle Public Schools hired an AIDS Education Specialist to plan and implement AIDS Awareness curriculum.