Teen Pregnancy Prevention

 New Resource!

 Teen Childbearing in Rural America

The teen birth rate in rural counties in the United States is nearly one-third higher than the rest of the country, according to new research from The National Campaign to Prevent Teen and Unplanned Pregnancy. This first-of-its-kind analysis finds that the teen birth rate in rural counties exceeds that of both suburban and major urban centers. In fact, as the level of urbanization decreases, the teen birth rate increases. Read the entire report. 

Introduction

In 2010, teenage pregnancy rates reached record lows. However, teen pregnancy, birth and abortion rates in the U.S. for teens between the ages of 15 and 19 are still the highest in the industrialized world.  Almost two-thirds of births among women under age 18 and more than half of births to those aged 18-19 are unintended.

Teen pregnancy is closely related to many significant social and economic issues, including the educational attainment of teen mothers and their children, poverty, lifetime income disparity for teen parents and overall child wellbeing. Teen mothers face numerous challenges, including financial difficulties, interrupted or postponed education, and unstable relationships. 

While this picture is bleak, the outcomes for the children of teen mothers are even worse. The children of teen mothers are more likely to have contact with the child welfare and criminal justice systems than children born to older mothers. Compared to 81 percent of children with older parents, only two-thirds of the children of teens will graduate from high school. Educational attainment affects lifetime income, and many children will never escape the cycle of poverty they are born into. Two-thirds of families started by teens live in poverty and nearly a quarter of teen mothers will depend on welfare within three years of the birth. More often than not, these families are single-parent households—nearly 80 percent of teen mothers do not marry the fathers of their children.

Although teen pregnancy and birth rates have declined by more than one-third since the 1990s, nearly one in three girls still become pregnant by age 20. Such high rates of teen pregnancy cost taxpayers nearly $11 billion in 2008 and include higher costs of public sector health care, child welfare, incarceration, and the lost tax revenues over the lifetime of teen parents and their children, resulting from low educational achievement and reduced earnings. The cost to states varies depending on the size of the state, teen pregnancy rates and participation in publicly funded programs.  In 2008 costs ranged from $16 million in North Dakota to $1.2 billion in Texas. 

NCSL Resources:

• LegisBrief: Preventing Pregnancy Among Older Teens (2011)

• State Legislatures Article: Taking Responsibility (2011)

• Multimedia: Sarah Brown, National Campaign to Prevent Teen and Unplanned Pregnancy (2011)

• LegisBrief: State Policies on Sex Education in Schools (2009)

• Teen Pregnancy Postcards (2009)

• Making a Difference for At-Risk Populations (2009)

 Teen Pregnancy & Education

High School Completion
Teen pregnancy and parenting are significant contributors to the drop-out rates among teen girls. Thirty percent of teenage girls who drop out of high school cite pregnancy or parenthood as a primary reason; this rate is higher for minority students. Thirty-six percent of Hispanic girls and 38 percent of African American teens say they dropped out of school because they became pregnant or had a child.  Only around half of teen moms receive their high school diploma compared to nearly 90 percent of women who did not give birth during their teenage years. 

Children of Teen Parents
The mother’s education is not the only victim of teen childbearing; children of teen moms often do not perform as well as children of older mothers on early childhood development indicators and school readiness measures such as communication, cognition and social skills. Overall, these children have lower educational performance; they score lower on standardized tests and are twice as likely to repeat a grade. Additionally, only around two-thirds of children born to teen mothers earn a high school diploma, compared to about 80 percent of children born to adults.  

Older Teens & Community Colleges
The pregnancy rate for women aged 18 to 19 is three times higher than that of younger teens. Older teens account for nearly 500,000 pregnancies and 300,000 births each year. Nearly 25 percent of births to women in this age group are teens who have previously given birth, greatly increasing the challenges for these mothers and their children. With almost 70 percent of 18- and 19-year-olds attending either high school or college, unplanned pregnancies can disrupt or derail educational achievement. Sixty-one percent of women who have children after enrolling in college fail to complete their degree, a rate which is 65 percent higher than that for students who did not have children.  Surveys indicate that close to half of all community college students have been pregnant or gotten someone pregnant at some point. 

Resources:

• Teen Pregnancy & High School Dropout: What Communities Can Do to Address these Issues, The National Campaign to Prevent Teen and Unplanned Pregnancy and America’s Promise Alliance (2012).   Read the full report, or a 2-page summary

• Why it Matters: Teen Childbearing, Education and Economic Wellbeing, The National Campaign to Prevent Teen and Unplanned Pregnancy, July 2012

• Teen Pregnancy Affects Graduation Rates (NCSL Postcard, August 2011)

• LegisBrief: Preventing Pregnancy Among Older Teens (NCSL, 2011)

• Community College Resources, The National Campaign to Prevent Teen and Unplanned Pregnancy

   

Teen Pregnancy & Poverty

Poverty is both a cause and a consequence of teen pregnancy and child bearing. Two-thirds of young unmarried mothers are poor and around 25 percent go on welfare within three years of a child’s birth. Low educational attainment among teen mothers affects their lifetime income levels. Teen mothers are less likely to complete high school or college, and are therefore also less likely to find well-paying jobs. This reality is evident in the fact that over the past 20 years, the median income for college graduates has increased 19 percent, while income among high school drop-outs has decreased 28 percent.

Only around 20 percent of fathers of children born to teen mothers marry the mothers. Therefore, child support generally represents a vital income source for these single parent families, accounting for 23 percent of family income among families that receive it. However, teen fathers may pay less than $800 a year in child support, compounding financial difficulties for the parent responsible for day to day care. Teen fathers are often poor themselves; research indicates that they are also less educated and experience earning losses of 10-15 percent annually.

Resources:

•  Teen Pregnancy, Poverty & Income Disparity, The National Campaign to Prevent Teen and Unplanned Pregnancy

Teen Pregnancy & Foster Care

Girls in foster care are much more likely to become teen mothers than their peers.  By age 19, pregnancy rates for girls in foster care are 2.5 times greater than that of their peers who are not in the system, meaning that nearly half of girls in foster care have become pregnant at least once by their 19^th birthday. Depending on the state, children in foster care typically “age out” of the system at age18 or 21. Currently states may provide Medicaid, health insurance jointly funded by states and the federal government, which finances prenatal care, delivery costs, and other health care services for foster children up to age 21. By 2014, however, the ACA will extend Medicaid to cover all young people in foster care up to age 26. 

Around 75 percent of teenage girls in foster care report being pregnant by age 21, compared with only one third of their peers; nearly two thirds of teens in foster care have been pregnant more than once by this age. Young men in foster care also have higher pregnancy rates: 50 percent of men aging out of foster care at age 21 say that they have gotten someone pregnant, compared to 19 percent of young men not in foster care. 

Resources:

•  Preventing Teen Pregnancy Through Outreach and Engagement: Tips for Working with Foster Care and Juvenile Justice, The National Campaign to Prevent Teen and Unplanned Pregnancy, 2012

•  Teen Pregnancy Among Young Women in Foster Care: A Primer, Guttmacher Institute, 2011

Federal Funding

Recently, the federal government has committed new funding and other resources to addressing teen pregnancy prevention.  

Personal Responsibility Education Program (PREP):

In September 2010, the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services awarded $45 million to 43 states, the District of Columbia, Puerto Rico and Micronesia to fund programs that emphasize both abstinence and contraception and educate adolescents on how to prevent pregnancy and sexually transmitted infections. Florida returned the award they recieved for FY2010 and has not applied for subesquent years. States may use PREP grants to fund efforts that have been scientifically proven to change behavior, such as delaying sexual activity or increasing contraceptive use. 

Programs are required to educate youth age 10-19 about responsible sexual behavior and must also address at least three of the following topics: healthy relationships, adolescent development, financial literacy, parent-child communication skills, education and employment preparation skills, and healthy life skills. Additionally, PREP funded programs are required to target young people who are at a higher risk for teen pregnancy; curricula must be medically accurate and age appropriate.

All states that submitted a plan were assured a minimum of $250,000, with no matching funds required from the state. States and territories that did not apply in 2010 are eligible to apply in 2011 and receive funding for both years, a provision which Hawaii and Nevada both utilized. Those that fail to apply either year will become ineligible to receive PREP funding, although non-profits in the states can compete to receive and administer the programs on behalf of the state. As of March 2012, local organizations and entities, including faith-based organizations, are expecting guidance from HHS to apply for a portion of the funding never claimed by the state governments in Florida, Indiana, North Dakota, Texas, Guam, American Samoa, the Northern Mariana Islands, the Marshall Islands and Palau.

Title V State Abstinence Education Grant Program:

The Abstinence Education Program has existed in its current form since 1996, although program funding lapsed briefly in 2009. The ACA renewed abstinence funding through FY 2014. In FY 2010, 29 states and Puerto Rico received nearly $33.5 million in grants for abstinence education. A 43 percent state match is required for states to receive abstinence funds. States may use funds for abstinence education, mentoring, counseling or adult supervised activities. While states are encouraged to use evidence-based programs and are required to address each point in the eight-point definition of abstinence education, individual states may determine how much emphasis to place on each point. Programs are required be medically accurate and to focus on youth at high risk of teen pregnancy, including homeless teens, those in or aging out of foster care, or who live in geographic areas with high teen birth rates. 

Pregnancy Assistance Fund

In September 2010, the Department of Health and Human Services awarded $24 million to 17 states to support pregnant and parenting teens and women continuing their education. A competitive state grant program, the Pregnancy Assistance Fund offers pregnant and parenting teens and women a continuous network of support services to assist them in completing educational degrees, whether high school or postsecondary, and to obtain and retain access to health care, family housing and other essential supports. Funds may also be used to combat violence against pregnant women. Through the Pregnancy Assistance Fund, states work with a broad range of stakeholders—such as high schools, institutions of higher education and community organizations—to provide these key services to pregnant teens and women who carry their pregnancies to term, and to parenting mothers.  

 Resources:

• State Legislatures Article: Taking Responsibility (NCSL, 2011)

Table 1

*Did not apply for funding in 2010. These ststes did apply in FY 2011, were awarded funding and were retroactively awarded FY2010 funds.
**Florida applied for and was awarded FY2010 funds ($2,795,687), but returned the money. Florida has not applied for subsequent grant funding.

Source: U.S. Department of Health and Human Services. Click here for FY2011 grants and beyond.

• Personal Responsibility Education Programs Grants

• Abstinence Grants

• Pregnancy Assistance Fund: Summary of Projects Funded for 2010  

Teen Pregnancy Prevention Initiative (TPP):

The evidence-based Teen Pregnancy Prevention Initiative (TPP) awarded a total of $100 million in competitive grants to a wide range of agencies and organizations. The grants fund both evidence-based programs and research and demonstration programs that develop, implement or refine innovative strategies for preventing teen pregnancy.

The $100 million includes:

• $75 million for Tier 1 grants to 75 grantees in 32 states and Washington D.C. Tier 1 grants support the replication of programs that have demonstrated effectiveness in preventing teen pregnancy.

• $25 million for Tier 2 grants to develop, replicate, refine, and test new models and innovate strategies to prevent and reduce teen pregnancy.                                        
             -  $15.2 million were awarded for “innovative approaches” programs through a competitive process to projects that focus on areas with high rates and populations with high risk of teen pregnancy. 
             -  $9.8 million supports eight cooperative, community-wide programs that were funded in partnership with the Centers for Disease Control.

Table 2

Source: U.S. Department of Health and Human Services