Journal of Health Care for the Poor and Underserved

Workshop TEENAGE PREGNANCY PREVENTION SHEILA PETERS, Ph.D. MARYUM SHAKIR, M.S.S.W. WILLIAM STARKS, M. Ed. CALVIN PETERS, B.B.A. TRACEY COGER CHRIS JOHNSON JOHNETTA NELSON SHAMEKA PANNELL JERMAINE WILLIAMS "1 Have A Future" Program Meharry Medical College 1005 D. B. Todd Boulevard Nashville, Tennessee 37208 Ms. Nelson: Good afternoon. We would like to welcome you to Meharry Medical College and the Institute on Health Care for the Poor and Underserved. This afternoon's presentation will focus on how we as adolescents can address the critical issue of teenage pregnancy in our communities. Adults say that there are too many children having babies. We know that not all of us have become sexually involved. But the challenge to do so is a topic of conversation in our peer groups. Ms. Pannell: Look at the focus on prom night alone. Many of us will or already have spent lots of money to take someone special to the prom. We dress up in nice clothes and have nice dinners. But the other side of the prom is the pressure by peers for young men and women to spend the night together and experiment with sexual expression and sometimes drugs and alcohol. Ms. Coger: Today, we want all of us to take time to reflect on our own personal options and the options we can try to make available to our peers in our communities. We ask that you think openly and honestly about the issues we Journal of Health Care for the Poor and Underserved, Vol. 2, No. 1, Summer 1991 8 Teenage Pregnancy Prevention discuss, and I hope that we can leave here today with new ways of fighting teenage pregnancy and other problems in our communities. Ms. Nelson: At this time, we would like to introduce ourselves and the staff members of the "I Have A Future" Program who will be helping us to look at these issues. Peer counselors and staff members of the "I Have A Future" Program introduced themselves to the audience. Ms. Nelson: "I Have A Future" is a teenage pregnancy prevention program. We try to prevent teenage pregnancy by providing education and health care services, and increasing life options. Increasing the life options of our peers and ourselves helps to keep us focused on who we are, what we are, and what we can become. We try to increase everyone's life options in lots of ways. One way is through our Family Life Education module. We talk about relationships in our families, relationships with friends, boyfriends and girlfriends , sexual intercourse, contraception, and sexually transmitted diseases. Most of all we talk about sexual responsibility. My other peer counselors will share more about our program with you. Mr. Williams: In "I Have A Future," we have a Prosocial Skills module. This activity helps all of us learn the best ways of getting along with people we meet in our life. Through lots of role playing, we practice skills such as "How to Give a Compliment," "How to Resist Group Pressure," and "How to Make a Decision." In this module, we spend special time talking about drugs and alcohol. Not only do we talk about the pressure our peers put on us, but the pressure advertisers put on us to drink and look successful. Mr. Johnson: We have a Entrepreneurial Program in "I Have A Future." Many of us are being trained in job readiness skills. We have our own company and we will show the posters that we are selling in our company. Some of us will have the opportunity to leam how to become entrepreneurs so that we will be able not only to get jobs, but create jobs for ourselves and the community. Ms. Coger When it is hard for some of us to talk about some of the real pressures around sexual involvement, family hassles, or drug and alcohol usage, we have a special place to go and that is to our CHARM or MATURE classes. CHARM stands for Choosing How to Adorn and Refine Myself. MATURE stands for Males Adorning, Thinking, and Using Refined Energies. These classes give us a place to talk about difficult problems and learn how...