Mayra Sanchez
Professor Christina Santana
Writing Project #2
English 102
5 March 2013
Part 1
Proposal: Teenage
Pregnancy and Prevention
In this paper I will explore the
issue concerning teenage pregnancy and its effects often seen in my community. I will provide possible solutions for teenage
pregnancy prevention which continues to be an on-going issue among adolescents in
the United States. Although teen pregnancy has generally decreased since 1991,
the United States still has a teenage birth rate that is nine times larger than
other developed countries. Some of the factors found to lead to teen pregnancy are
one or a mix of these: young age/unaware, prior school performance, economic
disadvantage, having older partners in a relationship, and/or a result of a
single parent household. Although these factors cannot determine why teenage
girls are getting pregnant, they are significant explanations for this
behavior.
Youth and the lack of education
about sex consequences are the main reason why teenage pregnancy occurs so
frequently. Young girls and boys are not informed of the possible consequences of
pregnancy and child-birth and the affects it can have on their health both
physically and emotionally. Teenage pregnancy is often not supported by the
family. This unfortunately causes adolescents to not obtain the proper prenatal
support and medical supervision. During the first months of pregnancy, the most
monitoring must be done with the development of the fetus in order to prevent
birth defects. Young mothers are also more at risk of having high blood
pressure during pregnancy than older women and are more likely to develop
preeclampsia. To avoid these complications, parents and schools should provide
enough support and closeness to adolescents to ensure they obtain the right
help.
The Federal Policy and Legislation
has increased advocating abstinence-only-till-marriage in schools rather than
provide forms of contraception for adolescents and teenagers. Abstinence has
proven to be ineffective for students to prevent pregnancy since studies have
shown a positive correlation between teen pregnancy and birthrates. Teaching
students about abstinence is not an effective technique to stop pregnancy. It
does not provide help for the students who chose to not be abstinent. Teenagers
are not only at risk of becoming pregnant, but can also be prone to sexually
transmitted diseases or infections (STI’s/STD’s). The United States not only
ranks first in teenage pregnancy but, unfortunately we also rank highest in the
spreading of STD’s.
Teen pregnancy in the United States
is most common within minority populations, such as Hispanics and African
Americans. According to statistics, the 15-17 age group birthrates among
African Americans are three times higher than Hispanics, as Hispanic’s
birthrates are four times higher than White adolescents. Parents also play a
very important role in teenage pregnancy since parents in some cultures avoid
talking about sex to their kids and ways to protect themselves from sexually
transmitted infections. Lack of communication is often seen in Hispanic
families, where sex until marriage is the expected standard for the culture. Having
traditional and religious parental pressure and abstinence-only education in
school leads to a lot of uninformed minority population since they are afraid
to speak to those they are closest to about sex.
Teen pregnancy has shown to have an
effect on academic performance and high school completion. The amount of
homework students receive in high school and the responsibility of being loving
mothers can really jeopardize the amount of time adolescent girls have to focus
on their studies. Take my friend for example who by the end of our high school
graduation became a mother of two children. She was a very smart and straight A
student, who took honors and advanced placement courses. Her pregnancy caused
her to take easier classes to balance out her schedule. I cannot blame her,
since I could not imagine how I would be able to balance out performing well in
school and supporting a family. However, her academic opportunities were kept at
the very minimum since she had to leave her honors classes for unchallenging
ones in order to graduate. Based on statistics, teenage mothers have a 10-12%
less likelihood to graduate from high school compared to girls who do not have
babies. This is because girls without children are able to focus their
attention only on school. Teenage moms also have a 14-29% less probability of
attending a higher education institution. A lot of teenage mothers make
graduating high school their only accomplishment because continuing an
education is far from reach.
Schools are currently supporting
students with School Based Health Centers (SBHC) which are supportive friendly
community resources helping the prevention of teenage pregnancy. However as
good as this resource is in terms of helping teenagers, only 40% of these sites
are allowed to prescribe and dispense contraception methods for teenagers.
One of the things schools can do to
decrease teenage pregnancy is to provide more interaction with programs like
“Baby Think it Over”. This program allows students to experience what it is
like to take care of a new-born baby by caring for a toy baby that is monitored
for good care. Many schools provide this type of exposure to students to show
students how their lives would be if that baby were theirs. However, in some
low income schools, students have to share a baby and are not allowed to take
them home to practice during the weekend. This defeats the purpose this program
tries to make since schools only provide these babies in the classroom and for
use with a partner. This approach however can have a biased effect since some
don’t take the baby as serious as it should since it’s a toy.
To decrease teen pregnancy and
transmission of STD’s in the United States, all schools should provide programs
that help explain the issues and concerns associated with teenage pregnancy/prevention.
They should provide information on how to practice safe intercourse for those
teenagers who do not want to practice abstinence. Schools should also provide
places that students could go to obtain various types of contraception and make
them accessible to students and perhaps free. By schools providing this type of
help for its students, teenage pregnancy will eventually decrease and the
spread of infections and diseases will be more controlled. It is impossible to
control the entire United States, but if each school provides this type of
support a difference will definitely be seen.
Part 2
This
problem concerning teenage pregnancy pertains to the high school district I
attended. Phoenix High School District is one of the largest high school
districts in the country consisting of more than 26,000 students. Of these
students, about 85-90% are Hispanic. In Metro Tech High School, the graduating
class this past spring, six or seven out of my ten closest friends in high
school were pregnant or had been pregnant in our high school careers.
One of my closest
friends from high school is currently 19 and is a mother of two boys one of
which is 3 and another which will soon be 1 year old. Although she was an
example of achieving success by graduating high school and maintaining her name
on the principals list, not all my friends had the same experience. Unfortunately
some of my friends didn’t perform well in classes, had to take classes that
were not challenging, and were not able to graduate high school.
Phoenix Union High
School District has the power to enact my solution by providing pregnancy
prevention classes and free/easy access to methods of contraception early into
every student’s high school educational experience to avoid pregnancy or the
spread of infections and diseases. Although they are currently providing a
health class that advocates sex-till-marriage and STD information, they do not
offer education about the different types of contraception.
By providing students
with contraception methods and giving them access to these at school will be
effective for reducing high school dropout rates, increasing academic
achievement, and helping students continue higher level education.
Part 3
Center for Educational Services
Phoenix Union High School District
4502 N. Central Avenue, Phoenix, AZ 85012
Dear Phoenix Union High School District Governing Board,
As a Metro Tech High
School recent graduate, I was able to notice some areas of improvement at Metro
Tech High School as well as in the Phoenix Union High School District. By
observations, I was able to easily notice the amount of high school friends who
were pregnant or had been pregnant by graduation. I was really surprised when I
realized that half of my close friends have 1-2 babies or are currently
pregnant.
During my four years at
Metro Tech, I never had been exposed to any type of sexual education class. The
closest I ever got to that topic was in health class which we only covered information
about STD’s but did not learn about contraception methods. During my freshman
year in high school I remember having one class session that explained
abstinence to students encouraging them to remain abstinent until marriage.
However since it was
only offered on a scheduled one time a year event, the students who did not
attend school that day missed everything. Fortunately, students who were
present were provided perhaps helpful information. Metro Tech also has a career
exploration class where students learn about child development. In this class
students take care of a doll baby that acts like a real baby. However, since
funding is low students had to share the baby and take care of it only in
class. By students sharing this responsibility during class, they do not take
teenage pregnancy seriously nor the responsibility of caring for a baby.
My suggestion is for the
district to take into consideration the high amount of pregnancies in the
district and propose sex education with contraceptive methods in schools rather
than abstinence. The district has high amount of dropout rates, low achievement
in rigorous classes, and a very low likelihood of students pursuing higher
education. With classes that teach contraception methods, students will have a
higher chance of performing better in classes by preventing teenage pregnancy.
Students should be
required to take a sexuality/contraception methods course to graduate. Since we
cannot control student level of sexual activity or age of intercourse, we can
provide beneficial education on pregnancy and STD prevention. By following this
addition to high school requirements, we can hopefully make a change that can
be seen throughout the district. With the help from the Phoenix Union High
School District Governing Board, we can create a district that is aware of
pregnancy contraception methods and by this prevent pregnancies. Thus by
preventing teenage pregnancy, students are more likely to be successful and pursue
higher education.
Thank you for your time,
Mayra Sanchez (student)
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