#30in30: Take This Pregnancy Test Or Else

I can distinctly remember 4 girls who were pregnant while I was in high school. I was shocked by only one of them. She was like me, a good girl in honors classes who never got in trouble. The other 3 girls I was not surprised by at all since they all had "reputations." I graduated from high school 15 years ago. (Wow, I'm getting old) Teen pregnancy has been an issue for decades. Politicians and teachers alike have lobbied for abstinence programs. The reality is that kids are having sex. They are not abstaining. Imagine my surprise to read about a Louisiana charter school that for the last 6 years has had a pregnancy policy. This policy states that any girl that a teacher or administrative suspects of being pregnant is forced to take a pregnancy test. If the student refuses to take the test or has a positive test, she is expelled from school. If she keeps her baby, she can not return to school. But, if she terminates the pregnancy, she is allowed to return. This policy makes no mention of the father. How is this fair? And, more so, what does this solve?

I am astonished that this policy has been allowed to exist for so long. Who in their right mind thought that this was a good idea? In high school, I know that I would have been very offended by a teacher asking me to take a pregnancy test. It's an invasion of privacy and it is humiliating at best. If I was a parent, I would be raising hell over this policy. It is unethical on so many levels. I wonder what this solves for the admins. Will it stop teens from having sex or will it stop girls from getting pregnant? Throwing the girls out of school clearly does not solve any problem. The girls not being in school just leaves a huge purple elephant in the room. I know when I was in high school when a person was in trouble and not in school, we had more to talk about. That's the way high schoolers operate. It's all we know in that space. 

The part that really gets me is the fact that the father of the baby has no repercussions. He is absolved of all wrong doing. Why is it ok for the father to remain at his school when the mother has to leave? And, this school is also pushing the appeal of an abortion on a teen mom. "If the pregnancy is terminated, the student can return." I get it, the school admins are pro-life. That is their choice. They do not have the right to push their agendas on possibly scared pregnant teens. None of this seems politically, morally, or ethically correct to me. Why did it take 6 years for people and parents to be outraged about this? My Mom would have caused major hell if this happened to me. My Mom has always been my biggest supporter. She's always had my back on every subject. I wonder where the mothers of these girls are and why aren't they doing something about it.

After the outrage reached national levels, the New Delhi Charter School came under much needed scrutiny. I've read that the policy has been banned as a result of a Change.org petition. The sad thing is the policy may be out but the hearts of the people involved have not changed. I am positive that pregnant teens will still not be accepted at this school. They will continue to be mistreated. They will never be seen in the same light as the non-pregnant students. Teen pregnancy isn't an ideal thing. But, it doesn't have to be a death sentence. I think the real tragedy is the fact that we aren't educating our teens about safe sex. The students who abstain do it because they want to. No information I received in high school about abstaining helped me make a choice. I did not have sex in high school for one HUGE reason. One of my older best friends got pregnant @ 15. That was all I needed to see. That did more for me than anything anyone told me. Her situation became my reality. I knew I didn't want a baby when I was a baby. This situation is insane. We cannot hide the problems of the world away. So, we shouldn't shun or hide teen pregnancy. It's a problem that we need to fix. But, the New Delhi Charter School's policy is not the way. We need a better resolution.