I can't really think of any "good" way to find out your teenage daughter is pregnant, can you? But the shenanigans at one charter school in Louisiana certainly ranks up on the list of "worst ways" to discover you're about to be a grandmother. When officials at the public school suspect a student is pregnant, they force her to get a pregnancy test.
Oh, and if she refuses or if she tests positive, the poor kid is kicked out of the Delhi Charter School. Pardon the rather crass response here: but are these people friggin nuts?
I'm going to say it again: I don't want my daughter ending up a teen mom. I would like her to have the advantages that come with being a grown woman with a career before the baby fairy comes a callin'.
But life happens. Kids happen. And if it came to pass, here's how I would want it to go down: I'd want her to take the pregnancy test at home ... not with some judgmental physician chosen by the school (part of Delhi's rules) hovering just outside the bathroom stall. She's sure to be under enough stress finding out she's pregnant; she doesn't need more.
What she would need is me, her mom, there to comfort her and help her start to plan our next steps as a family. And you had better believe that plan would include doing everything possible to ensure she stayed in school and got her high school diploma.
Pregnancy still ranks as the number one reason teenage girls drop out of school. The burden high school dropouts put on the economy is extraordinary -- by some estimates it's as much as $8 billion on the shoulders of the American taxpayer -- and then you have to add in the emotional costs. It's bad for the teen, bad for her baby, bad for the community. And yet, surveys of those who dropped out have shown the majority would have stuck with it until graduation if they'd just had some adult support to make sure it happened.
What's happening in Delhi, Louisiana right now is being challenged by the ACLU for its likely illegality because the school receives public funding. But this type of discrimination against public teens shouldn't be practiced anywhere -- even private schools -- unless the message we want to send our kids is "we wish you the absolute worst in life." Who really wants to tell their kid that?
What would you do if your kid's school forced her to take a pregnancy test?
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Comments 133
wtf that is wrong they should not put them on the spot like that. i would be kicking so butt like no joke...i have a lil girl and that is not how i would want to find out... and also why do the boy not get in trouble thats wrong it takes two not one
There are 3 girls pregnant in my son's middle school, I only agree to the testing IF they get the parental consent
Ranting Syko is aply named. KIds make mistakes. And not all teens who get pregnant are promiscuous. Ever heard of date rape? Abuse? And kids make MISTAKES. It's horrible the poor girls are shamed like this. Should they be taught betetr? Absolutely. But, again, kids do make mistakes and poor choices. That's what being a kid is about. It just sucks that these days it's getting knocked up and not just lifting 8 tracks from the record store.
Aptly named.
its a CHARDER school ppl....this is a high ranking school that you have to win a lottery to get into. Its a privlage...teach your girls to keep their legs closed and embarressment wont have to happen...
This is crazy! I would NEVER want my daughter to have to go thru that trama at school! If my girls did end up pregant, then I want her to be able to come to me, I want to be the first ones to know, not some random person at my kids school! Whats happening to the world these days?