Whether inquisitive, nave or just plain perverted, Syracuse University students can get credit for simply wanting to know more about sex.

CFS 388, more commonly known as Human Sexuality, blends the best of Playboy with The Learning Channel to make for a class that covers everything students didn’t learn in middle-school sex-ed. The class constantly makes the top five at RateMyClass.com and is accompanied on the site by comments such as, ‘this is the BEST class ever!!!’, ‘it was like watching two hours of stand-up comedy a week!’ and ‘take it, you’ll have fun.’

‘We always kid or tease that it’s popular because its human sexuality, but I would like to think because it’s meaningful to students,’ said Dr. Joseph Fanelli, who teaches the class. ‘It’s one of those courses taken outside most people’s major that is relevant and personally helpful to them.’

Despite the title, the class covers a much broader range of subjects than just the act of sex. Different course materials focus on things like development, desire, intimacy, sexual problems, diversity, HIV and AIDS, transgender, sexual abuse and almost everything in between. This is not your average sexual information class.

‘People may think that human sexuality is going to be more like the sex-ed class from high school, but it’s not like that at all,’ said Becky Crockett, a sophomore illustration major. ‘This is the stuff they didn’t teach you. In high school they teach you the basics, like diseases, but this is everything else.’

‘Sex is always a taboo subject, and the fact that you can blurt out things like ‘What do guys like? Guy like boobs,’ in this class makes it very fun,’ said Lauren Dellinger, a sophomore architecture major. ‘It’s also the fact that the teacher is so relaxed about it. You can make the most absurd comments and he laughs it up and then answers the questions.’

And absurd comments are a popular part of the class. In any given day, questions like ‘Can you go blind by masturbating too much?’ are posed to Fanelli. His reply: ‘Only if you do it while staring at the sun.’

‘The way Dr. Fanelli presents the class is great,’ said Gary Thomas, a sophomore pre-med and psychology major. ‘It’s a very open class. Anything that is questionable or massively stereotyped, he approaches with comedy, and it opens people’s eyes.’

Because of the popularity of the course, lectures can contain anywhere from 200 to 400 students, and students who arrive late are forced to sit in the aisle. Some of the information covered may also seem repetitive because of the large range of topics covered.

But the class is not as much of a fluff course as its reputation may suggest.

‘It’s easy and it’s not easy,’ said Melissa Orman, a senior psychology major. ‘You have to show up and you have to do the reading. And [Fanelli’s] a pretty easygoing teacher, but you actually have to put in some work. It’s like he said at the start of the class, it’s easy to pass, but hard to get an A.’

Yet most would agree that, even with those few problems, what the class contains far outweighs any of the bad issues.

‘First of all, it’s human sex, so people are already interested,’ said Brian Cass, a teaching assistant for the class and a graduate student in marriage and family therapy. ‘It’s not just another class where you sit there and get lectured, too; you actually have a good time. I have never heard anyone say a bad comment about the class.’

Alanna Sredzinski, another TA for the class and graduate student in child and family studies, agrees that the students enrolled are actually interested in coming to class.

‘I think students get excited about the class,’ Sredzinski said. ‘I think they think it’s cool that someone can talk about sex and in a way they can relate to. They all laugh a lot in this class.’

For Fanelli, the laughter is as rewarding as the other responses he’s received over the years.

‘Most students will say, ‘Human sexuality! What can you teach me that I don’t already know?” Fanelli said. ‘And time after time after time, students will then comment how meaningful the class is, how much fun they had and how much they learned from it.’

Published on October 19, 2004 at 12:00 pm