The Education of Shelby Knox (2005) on Netflix
NR20051h 16mDocumentary
Fifteen-year-old Shelby Knox joins the Lubbock Youth Commission, where schools teach abstinence only. She campaigns for comprehensive sex education while holding to her Southern Baptist faith.
- Netflix3.4/5
- IMDb7.3/10446 votes
- Rotten Tomatoes86%
Trailer
Plot summary
Shelby Knox is a fifteen-year-old Southern Baptist in Lubbock, Texas. The city's public schools teach an abstinence-only curriculum, and a conservative preacher urges students to pledge abstinence until marriage. Lubbock has among the highest rates of teen pregnancy and sexually transmitted diseases in the country. Shelby joins the Lubbock Youth Commission, a group of high school students who represent a youth voice in city government. When the commission confronts the city's sexual health crisis and campaigns for comprehensive sex education, Shelby takes up the cause alongside the religious beliefs she was raised in.
Cast
Did you know?!Facts and trivia about The Education of Shelby Knox (2005)
Can contain spoilers, watch the movie first.
- The Dixie Chicks' 2006 album Taking the Long Way includes "Lubbock or Leave It", a song based on The Education of Shelby Knox. Band member Emily Robison said the film, about a girl trying to get Lubbock schools to teach sex education, showed what happens when that information is kept from people.
- Dixie Chicks lead singer Natalie Maines, who is from Lubbock, spoke on a 2006 episode of VH1 Storytellers about watching the documentary and drawing on her own experiences of living in the city to write the song "Lubbock or Leave It" from the 2006 album Taking the Long Way.
