Although many don’t talk about it, teenage pregnancy has become a serious issue in countries across the world. Raising children to stay out of trouble and avoid risky behavior is really hard, considering the influence of the society, surroundings, and the Internet. Parents sometimes don’t even have control over their children’s lives and don’t know what children do in schools and after school which makes it hard to provide them with adequate care and guidance. This is why teenage pregnancy prevention programs in schools are necessary – they can provide teenagers with detailed information about everything they need to know, and with the help of their parents, help reduce the number of teenage pregnancies.
Teenage Pregnancy in Schools
With the number of teenage pregnancies, it’s paramount that all schools become included in this problem and provide appropriate education and care. To be able to ensure the necessary help and education about teen pregnancy in schools, all schools and parents should be aware of the following facts:
- More than 500,000 teens ranging from ages 15 and 19 give birth annually within the US.
- Although teenage pregnancy rate is declining in the United States, the US still has a higher number of teen pregnancies than other industrialized countries
- A high number of teen pregnancy in the US includes low income, young women of color
- It is common in mothers that were abused in their childhood
- Some research shows that teenage mothers are more likely to suffer physical abuse during pregnancy
- Finally, at most a third teenage mothers graduate from high school.
Teenage Pregnancy and School Programs
Considering there are over 50 million children and teens attending public schools in the US, it’s important to emphasize the influence of schools in pregnancy prevention programs. Cooperating with parents is one of the best ways to provide the kids with the necessary information and education, but working closely with doctors such as the experts from the Worldwide Pediatrics Group can help come up with a program that will educate the kids and ensure they have a happy and healthy childhood.
In addition to this, schools can adopt an inclusive way to this issue and help in four distinct ways:
1. All schools should enforce programs that involve support, tutoring, education, and recreation as these programs can help decrease high-risk behavior among teens and prevent teen pregnancy in schools.
2. Schools should promote values that include academic success, self-worth, and connectedness to reduce the chances of high-risk behavior among teenagers.
3. Schools should try to implement programs that promote positive youth development. These programs should be able to support resilience in children and provide more information about the following topics:
- Connectedness – feeling safe, establishing direct relationships with other people and kids, and feeling like you’re part of a distinct group
- Confidence – having great self-esteem in addition to knowing you have control over your life
- Character – feeling competent about what options are out there and what is attainable, making good career choices, leading a healthy life, and having meaningful relationships with your family, friends and fellow classmates.
Generally, schools should be required to prepare students for prosperous futures, striving to foster young and competent people who are able to make healthy life choices. All this can be done by including appropriate character education in the school curriculum, providing attentively crafted learning activities in the lesson plans, and promoting nonscholastic and out of school activities and programs.
4. Ultimately, people in and out of the educational system have to cooperate and share the same values and goals to be able to provide the kids with the necessary education and tutoring on preventing teen pregnancy.
With the help of all available resources, all schools together with the parents can help provide the kids with comprehensive knowledge on how to prevent teen pregnancy and promote healthy lifestyle choices.
