Running head: TEEN PREGNANCY

Teen Pregnancy
Shauntia Gillespie
University of Phoenix
BSHS 485
Darla Roberts
November 10, 2014

Teen Pregnancy
Teen pregnancy is a huge epidemic across the country and in Rhode Island the numbers are still climbing. There are organizations that will help a pregnant teenager or a teenager infected with a Sexually transmitted disease. Local communities have shelters, group homes, and clinics, which are all helpful, but they are also local agencies. Local agencies can try to fix the problem with the resources they have and the connections they have made within the community, but sometimes there is outside help needed. A larger way to look at helping these teenagers with pregnancy and sexual health would be a global organization that can help because they have resources all over the country and in other countries as well. There are organizations that travel and offer scholarships to their young advocates so they may be able to continue the work, or even continue to lead a productive life, which they may have not been able to do under difference circumstances. There are local agencies that will offer childcare for teen mothers, and there are even some communities that will provide childcare in the schools so they can continue their education. The advocates can petition for the schools to teach sex education and health facts. Globally know organizations can do that because their resources and connections are wide spread and they have high contributors. Advocate for Youth is an organization that advocates heavily for the youth of today. They assist with education, teen pregnancy, infections, and they also help young adults with personal issues they may have.
This organization takes in donations by phone, email, mail, and anyway possible to help the cause. They are not just stationed in one state they assist the youth in different states. Advocates for Youth have been around since 1980 and they have offices extending beyond the United States. They have a variety of branches dealing with all races, ages, and sexes. Each branch of their organization has specifics geared toward helping every type of person, for example, if there is a pregnant teen she can get help in the same place a low income client can. There are youth advocating for youth. There are younger people who volunteer their time and their advice because some of them were once the client of this organization. It is easier sometime because a young person who is a deep situation may feel more comfortable with someone closer to their age, or if a community is being introduced to the programs offered they may be more likely to listen to the person who most resembles them in age. Youth activist from low-income and middle income countries connect and share information about the work they are doing in their prospective environments. Along with them connecting they also receive information about scholarships and get all the updated information pertaining to advocacy. Their advocacy revolves around their core values of the 3Rs which is Rights, Responsibility, and Respect. At the societal level the advocates believe youth have a right to accurate and complete sexual health information, youth deserve respect, and society has the responsibility to provide young people with the tools to be sexually healthy. These are great values for the societal side, but for the interpersonal relationships in young people’s lives the advocates use the 3Rs in different manners. They believe young people have the right to be safe and healthy within their relationships and be able to make choices based on their beliefs and free from coercion. Young people should show respect for each other within their relationships by taking others needs and emotions into consideration ("Advocate For Youth", 2014). Also, young people are responsible for protecting their own emotional and physical health as well as their partners. The 3Rs are all over their core systems but it is important because that is what the advocacy is based on. When helping young adults it is important that you are not talking at them, but you are not their friend at the same time. Advocacy in this organization is geared toward helping the youth to help themselves and to educate them so they can educate everyone else. Since 1998 there has been an annual study tour to France, Germany, and the Netherlands to understand why the sexual health outcomes are more positive in those three areas than in the United States. This is an advocacy outreach because they are testing other countries to see how we can make our country better about sexual health.
In the Advocate for Youth organization there are mostly Universities and Colleges partnering with their works, but there are churches and local organizations. For stakeholders and partners there are 54 organizations involved and 23 board members who are over this organization ("Advocate For Youth", 2014). Within each of the partnerships and stakeholders there are a minimum of one meeting a month where topics of the issue are discussed and what should be done about the issue in the neighborhood. There are colleges and universities that have taken it upon themselves to post flyers and advertise vigorously because they are involved. The board members consist of mostly doctors who have done their research and can have figures and statistics backing the information being distributed. Amazingly there are also youth on the board and involved with these meetings as leaders. They are stepping up for a cause and in Rhode Island there are so many pregnant youth there is an abundance of educational literature sent to the recreation areas. There is free contraception available at any doctor’s office or local hospitals. There is financial history available on their website because they want those who donate and those who would like to be invested to see their funds going to good use. There are board members who make most of the decisions in regards to steps the organization will make toward limiting teen pregnancy and raising the awareness of youth. The local branches always take feedback to the leaders are to give feedback to the core leaders to discuss in their meetings about the plan for the company and what they are to do.
When it comes to advocacy an advocate will teach and reach out for what they believe and sometimes it may not match with the views of society. When the society changes their mind or the attention shifts advocacy can be affected, such as, investor and grant money pulling away from the organization. It does make advocating a little harder and there has to be a bigger push for what is believed, but it does not change the issue still being a problem. Teen pregnancy has been an issue for centuries, but the only difference now is the pregnancies are not hidden. Along with the pregnancies not being hidden the awareness is not being taught as it should. There are schools who will not teach sexual health because they believe it to introduce sex into the children’s minds. The cold hard true is sex is around and the dangers need to be taught. Unfortunately there are companies such as those who made the morning after pill, originally for rape victims, who may stand against teaching sexual education about protection. On the up side there are companies such as hospitals, schools and churches who would stand with the advocates about safe sex or no sex at all in order to preserve youth. Many believe a part of the deficit in the country if from assistance to those who are low income, when the fact is if there was more money going into preventing low income and teen pregnancy then there would be less assistance needed. When the public shifts there opinion on what is right and what is wrong it doesn’t have an effect on what is being advocated, only how hard to advocate for the cause. Right now this group has petitions to the government and maybe it will make it to the house asking them to designate 1 billion dollars to help end the mortality of young mothers. Between 15-19 complications from child birth is the leading cause of death in young women in developing countries right now ("Take Action Internationally", 2014). They are advocating and asking for petitions to be signed online so there is definitely no stopping them no matter which way society chooses to side with.
To sum it up, Advocacy is important and sometimes it is not an easy road. This particular organization helps children and young adults all over the country to fight more than just teen pregnancy, but they are fighting a battle they intend to win. Teen pregnancy is everywhere and offering education is the key to preventing future pregnancies by teenagers. Offering contraception and advocating getting more school involvement is the key factor in getting out the word. This organization has already tackled many colleges and they are partnered, the next step is tackling local high schools and getting more involvement from the communities to prevent the epidemic from spreading. They are trying to advocate for funding to help our young people become someone to remember do disappear into someone people forgot they knew.

References
Meier, Dr. K. S. (2014). How to Describe a Political Climate. Retrieved from http://classroom.synonym.com/describe-political-climate-16872.html

Take Action Internationally. (2014). Retrieved from http://amplifyyourvoice.org/1billion

Advocate for Youth. (2014). Retrieved from http://www.advocatesforyouth.org