What's New
July 21, 2010
Baby High debuts on MTV
By Jane Hainze
Anyone who has experienced high school knows that it can be a difficult time for everyone. The pressure of balancing tough academics, a social life that can often feel more important than anything else, budding relationships, and sports as well as other extracurricular activities are enough to make anyone feel overwhelmed. Add a baby into that already weighty equation and the difficulty multiplies ten fold. It’s isn’t particularly surprising then that so many teen parents struggle under the pressure and eventually choose to drop out of high school to instead focus on providing for their newborn’s needs. This is where special schools like TAPP (Teenage Parenting Program) come in. These high schools provide education solely for teenage girls who are either currently pregnant or have just given birth. By separating these young women from their peer group in a normal high school, the schools are able to focus on working with a teen mom’s considerable responsibilities by providing child care while they are in classes, a shorter school day so that they can go to work to afford the cost of their child, and perhaps most helpful, a peer group and staff that is understanding of what they are going through. Their overall goal is to provide school environment that keeps the girls learning and in school, but simultaneously also teaches them how to be loving, responsible parents.
Having had success in its other reality shows which depict a realistic glimpse at the lives of teen parents, MTV has created a one hour special chronicling the lives of four girls at Westport Alternative High School in Kentucky (a TAPP school). Viewers may revel in the glaring differences between a normal high school and a TAPP school such as the one that these girls attend. For instance, instead of heading to their locker to pick up their books upon arriving at school, students at Westport first drop by the day care center, located within the school, to say goodbye to their baby for the day. While school life becomes easier to negotiate for these teen moms at a TAPP school, the show is careful to emphasize that these young women’s lives are still far from normal and carefree. While crowding around the pink lockers that adorn the school’s hallways, the girls chatter about custody battles with their child’s father instead of a more normal high school conversation about an upcoming history exam. Or instead of gossiping about their latest crush at the lunch tables, one teen mom is emphasizing the importance of getting an epidural to another expecting teen whose delivery date is fast approaching. Like many of MTV’s similar shows, “Baby High” serves as more evidence for America’s teenagers of just how much teenage pregnancy can drain the youth and carefree nature from these young individual’s lives.
Check out MTV’s website here to learn more about and watch clips from “Baby High”
June 15, 2010
Planned Parenthood of Wisconsin is Hiring Teen Health Promoters
Planned Parenthood Of Wisconsin (PPWI) is seeking Teen Health Promoters to join a dynamic team of leaders committed to improving the health of youth in Milwaukee!
TEEN HEALTH PROMOTERS will:
- Provide 1-on-1 and group education sessions at our health centers and at area community organizations
- Staff our Teen Hotline
- Serve on our youth advisory committee for program/marketing development
- Receive money for their work
- Have fun!
Through PPWI’s teen outreach we will identify and break down the barriers that prevent teens from accessing health care and contraceptives and provide youth with the knowledge, skills, support and resources they need to prevent unintended pregnancy.
This team of Teen Health Promoters will be trained as health educators to provide education and outreach at area community organizations and teen clinics. They will also respond to questions on our teen help line. Also, our teen health promoters will serve as an advisory committee to help us keep our services and programs youth-friendly. This team of young leaders will help us to create marketing messages and outreach strategies for reaching youth on their own turf & in their language.
Interested? Please send your cover letter and resume if you have them, in Microsoft Word format, to JoCasta Zamarripa. You'll also need to fill out their application. Questions? Call JoCasta at 414-289-3779.
June 15, 2010
G20 Girls, U.S.: For Teenagers, Parenthood Comes Easy, and So Can Poverty
Devoting resources to girls could lead to gains all areas, suggests the World Bank, among others, observing that countries that don't invest in girls have slower growth & reduced income. It's not just the developing world where girls get shortchanged: This week, we tell the stories of girls from G20 countries struggling with sex, sexism & cruelty.
It was a breathtaking shock, severing her from her childhood and ending her all too brief youth. Her own childhood is so recently behind her she can almost reach out and touch it. At 17, and in her last year of high school (h.s.), Carla Chacon learned she was pregnant. In November, she is due to join the ranks of the 56 in 1,000 American girls who find themselves mothers in their teens, a statistic that is the highest in the Western world.
“My friends said I should just have an abortion,” says the dark-haired teen, glancing down at her swelling waistline. “I felt like, ‘Well, I decided to have sex. It wasn’t the baby’s fault.’ and I couldn’t do it.” Some girls Carla knows had abortions. Others had been pregnant even younger and given birth a couple of times before they reached 18.
Morning sickness struck, and she began to miss classes. “They kicked me out of school,” she says quietly. “My mom went to talk to them, but it didn’t help.”
The dramatic change in her future began to sink in. Instead of receiving her h.s. diploma and beginning nursing studies as a childless teen, she would be responsible for a tiny, helpless baby. Although she is now looking forward to the birth with joy, there is also trepidation.
In the confusing world of America’s teens, accidental pregnancy looms large as pressure to have sex comes from all directions, while abstinence is touted as the best defense. “We don’t learn much about sex in school,” she says with a shrug. “They will only answer questions that are on the curriculum.”
The emphasis on abstinence rather than information and counseling, a product of pressure from powerful religious groups, has created a host of social problems: children of mothers who drop out of school, for instance, will grow up poor 64% of the time. Unsurprisingly, few young people Carla knows believe in abstinence. “Some girls want to fit in so bad, they won’t say no.”
In Carla’s case, a relationship with a steady boyfriend spurred her to take birth control pills, but a bad hormonal reaction convinced her to stop. Carla’s boyfriend works as a computer technician. When the shock of her pregnancy wore off, she says, he adapted willingly to the realities of looming fatherhood, accompanying her to medical appointments. Unlike many pregnant teens, she expects him to be there when she gives birth.
The precariousness of life during a deep recession makes adulthood a serious business. A young family without money is a fragile vessel on a cruel sea. “I’ve been looking for a job, but I haven’t found anything,” Carla says. “I’m studying too, so I can take my exams in July.” If all goes well, and with her mother’s babysitting help, she will enroll in college for a nursing degree.
The rate of child poverty in the U.S. will climb to nearly 22% this year, says a new study by the Foundation for Child Development. Nearly 18% of children now live in families with an “insecure” source of food.
Now 18, Carla takes a fleeting backward glance at her youth, and turns again to the uncertain present. “The main thing now is protecting the baby, educating him properly, so he won’t make the same mistakes that I have.”
Click here to read the full article from The Toronto Star.
June 15, 2010
Research Shows Only Mixed Results in Efforts to Tame Teen Sex Behavior
Young people today really aren't any more promiscuous, they're actually less so, according to a new study from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention's National Center (CDC) for Health Statistics. This survey of more than 2,700 teens found that 43% of boys & 42% of girls, 15 - 19 have had sex, a figure that's little changed since 2002 & compares with 55% of boys & 51% of girls in 1988.
The new data, from 2006 - 2008, also showed that contraceptive use has remained steady in recent years, with 87% of boys & 79% of girls reporting that they employed some form of birth control the 1st time they had sex.
"We've been able to at least hold the line on the number of kids still deciding to wait on becoming sexually active," says Kathy Woodward, medical director of the Adolescent Health Center at Children's National Medical Center. "At least we're staying the course, especially when you consider all of the media influences out there."
Bill Albert, of the National Campaign to Prevent Teen and Unplanned Pregnancy, agrees pointing out that teen pregnancy is down roughly 39% since its peak in 1990. Despite an overall decline in pregnancies over the last 2 decades, the stats also revealed a slight uptick in 2005, (the most recent year for which there is data).
"The news on teen sex "is really a mixed bag. Many sexually experienced teens are using contraception, but the bad news is they're not using it consistently enough, and the condom appears to be losing some ground, which is a concern in terms of rising teen birth rates." says Woodward. She's also alarmed about the significant jump in the number of teens using the spectacularly ineffective "rhythm method" as birth control - now 17% of girls, up from 11% in 2002.
Another recent CDC report found that 1/4 adolescent females has a sexually transmitted infection such as HPV or chlamydia. "Unfortunately, STI rates are also mirroring how we're going to do with HIV rates, which have been slowly creeping up, especially for young women,"said Woodward.
Some are more at risk than others: researchers reported that overweight girls are more likely than their thin peers to have sex before age 13, to have multiple partners as teens & to have unprotected sex.
When talking to your kids about sex, accept that it's going to be a challenge, says Christopher Daddis, who researched how 222 teenagers talked to their parents about dating and sex for a recent study. He found that girls tend to disclose more about crushes, relationships and other dating topics than boys, that both sexes prefer to share such information with their mothers rather than their fathers, and that they were equally reticent to discuss sex, per se, with either parent. Younger teens had a higher level of communication than older adolescents on all topics, and those who reported a greater level of trust with their parents also opened up more about sex, especially girls.
"It comes down to creating this climate where children are going to be comfortable telling you about any issue in their life," says Daddis, acknowledging that keeping some aspects of life private from parents is a normal part of growth & development. "It's not parents' nagging or asking about their childrens' sex lives that is good for decreasing problem behavior; it's having the kid voluntarily tell you what they're up to. That's where that information and knowledge needs to come from, in order to make a real difference."
Click here to read the full article from The Washington Post.