Part of the discussion has, inevitably, spun off into whether or not minors should have access to contraceptives without parental consent, but surprisingly, that question and the one of sex education are NOT the revelatory aspect of this story (which puts me in direct disagreement with my good friend Philosophy).

Why? This may seem surprising, and let me say I am wholeheartedly in favor of comprehensive sex education in schools, as I am in favor of girls under the age of 18 being able to make decisions about their reproductive health on their own (but under the full supervision of a medical doctor, NOT a school nurse).

The reason is that, at least according to the article that I read on the story (from Time Magazine: these girls ARE receiving sex-ed in school. The problem is that they WANT to get pregnant because some of those who did not get pregnant were disappointed. If you have girls who are willing to sleep with a 24-year-old homeless man in order to produce a being who will love them unconditionally, birth control and better access to it (or, for that matter, sex-ed) isn't going to make a whit of difference.

These girls are getting pregnant because they don't see any other future for themselves, and I would put good money on the fact that many of them come from broken/abusive homes (I say this because of the fact that they seem to be under the impression their baby will automatically and eternally love them, just like that). Something is very wrong in this community as a whole if this is the attitude of so many of its young girls.

It's a sad and revealing commentary (but not one that I've seen the news media pick up on thus far) about what happens when young people feel they have no stability or prospects in life. It's great that the school is providing services to help these girls stay in school, but what then? As teenage single parents, they are at a high risk for remaining in poverty or struggling to get by for the rest of their lives, which is in itself a heartbreaking thought.

So what can be done? The school can certainly play a role in supporting these young women who are new mothers, but I firmly believe they should implement some kind of comprehensive, experience-based learning for these girls to teach them about pregnancy and childbirth. I strongly suspect that if you tell teenage girls that they are going to be up at 5 am feeding the baby for the third time, that breast-feeding can be excruciatingly painful, that they may never lose the weight, that they may experience vaginal tears that permanently affect their sex lives, etc., that many will have at least a second thought about what they're getting into. Have the girl who was interviewed, who has realized what hard work a baby is, come in and speak to these classes after she's been up all night.

What about the classic 'carry around this sack of flour/baby doll/egg for three days and treat it like a baby' experiment, only somehow actually having the girls work with new moms and babies?

The community also needs to step up to the bat and figure out what role they can play in preventing teenage pregnancy (and hint - the answer does not lie in only preaching abstinence). But most of all, these kids need some impression that they have a future. That they can achieve things beyond the confines of their depressed, blue-collar town, or that opportunities will be created for them to revitalize their town.

It would be wonderful if the only problem this town faced was that its students were being given incomplete sex-ed, and that they lacked access to contraceptives. Those problems are easily (well, in comparison to a generation of babies who are being born into less than ideal situations) remedied. Sadly, in this case, what seems to be a black and white story really reveals a whole lot more, and it's going to take a lot of time and effort to even begin to fix these problems.