Maternity Leave for High School Girls
As a girl that went to a high school that had a daycare center in it not for the teachers, but for the students, I think we might be dangerously close to crossing a line with this.
This issue is sensitive for me. On one hand, materinity leave for kids! My entire being revolts at the idea! But after you relax a bit and think about it ... what is better for these children and their babies? That their mothers have to drop out or be held back because they can't keep up with school work? Or that we make allowances and change programs to allow these girls an education?
But I don't like it. It speaks volumes about what's happened to our values and our society. And it's policies like this one that make me terrified to send a teenage girl of my own to public school. What pressure to deal with. Forget wanting to be chaste, heck if I have a baby I get 4 weeks off from school! And don't tell me they won't think about it like that. Their kids, first and foremost, and I am not so old I don't remember 10 years ago and my own thought processes. Plus, I never really grew up. :) (Also, I'm not taking away from the fact that they'd also be scared out of their minds ... I'm just saying to those that may not be pregnant, the idea of 4 weeks off would be appealing before the reality of having a kid set in.)
I had to walk by the daycare center in our school to go and catch the bus. And I took the bus A LOT (oh the SHAME!). I remember looking at those girls, my age, 16 and 17, picking up their babies and walking out to go home. It was like watching a foreign film with no subtitles. I had no concept of it. And the girls whom were pregnant (and you don't get a daycare without having your share of those) walked around proud, and held hands with their boyfriends and talked about how great their lives were.
Looking back, I think it's sad how quickly they had to age. While I had another decade of youth and frivolity, they were mothers and now have ten year old children.
The babies would play in the outside playground, and I must have been at gym or something when I'd see them outside being pulled in carts and playing. But I always thought that was odd too.
We talk about the AIDs epidmic and Bird Flu and the Health Care Crisis; why don't we talk about this? If I'm reading it right, that article says 50% of girls age 15-17 will be or are pregnant. 50%!
Is that really okay?
Kayla Lewis, who is five months pregnant and a senior at East, requested that the board establish maternity leave for students at a Dec. 20 public hearing.
"After you have the baby, your body needs time to heal," the 18-year-old said.
That is true, said Dr. Sarah Grope, pediatrician at HealthOne's Rocky Mountain Hospital for Children in Denver.
"To just assume that two days after having a baby they can go back to school is ridiculous at best," Grope said. "During that time, they should be able to do their schoolwork and give time to bond with their children."
School-board member Michelle Moss was baffled that schools were giving girls unexcused absences after birth.
"It's critical that these young women have a chance to bond with their babies," Moss said.
"Maybe we do need a policy. Clearly, as a district, we have to look at what is going on with our young women. We've got to look at the birth-control issues and teen pregnancy and how we best help them deal with it and still graduate."
Denver has one of the highest teen-pregnancy rates in the state. Of every 1,000 girls ages 15 to 17, 54.5 will become pregnant in the city, compared with 24.3 throughout Colorado, according to state health statistics.
The district has a school for pregnant teens and new moms, Florence Crittenton School, but it has a waiting list. Plus, many students want to remain at the school where they started, said Head, the counselor at East.
This issue is sensitive for me. On one hand, materinity leave for kids! My entire being revolts at the idea! But after you relax a bit and think about it ... what is better for these children and their babies? That their mothers have to drop out or be held back because they can't keep up with school work? Or that we make allowances and change programs to allow these girls an education?
But I don't like it. It speaks volumes about what's happened to our values and our society. And it's policies like this one that make me terrified to send a teenage girl of my own to public school. What pressure to deal with. Forget wanting to be chaste, heck if I have a baby I get 4 weeks off from school! And don't tell me they won't think about it like that. Their kids, first and foremost, and I am not so old I don't remember 10 years ago and my own thought processes. Plus, I never really grew up. :) (Also, I'm not taking away from the fact that they'd also be scared out of their minds ... I'm just saying to those that may not be pregnant, the idea of 4 weeks off would be appealing before the reality of having a kid set in.)
I had to walk by the daycare center in our school to go and catch the bus. And I took the bus A LOT (oh the SHAME!). I remember looking at those girls, my age, 16 and 17, picking up their babies and walking out to go home. It was like watching a foreign film with no subtitles. I had no concept of it. And the girls whom were pregnant (and you don't get a daycare without having your share of those) walked around proud, and held hands with their boyfriends and talked about how great their lives were.
Looking back, I think it's sad how quickly they had to age. While I had another decade of youth and frivolity, they were mothers and now have ten year old children.
The babies would play in the outside playground, and I must have been at gym or something when I'd see them outside being pulled in carts and playing. But I always thought that was odd too.
We talk about the AIDs epidmic and Bird Flu and the Health Care Crisis; why don't we talk about this? If I'm reading it right, that article says 50% of girls age 15-17 will be or are pregnant. 50%!
Is that really okay?
Comments
I don't have the numbers but I think that the difference is significant.