When I was 15 I moved to Arizona right before the school year began. I met many new friends at a youth group I started attending through the church. one of the girls I befriended was pregnant. I really enjoyed hanging out with her and asked my parents one night if she could spend the night. Their answer NO, they didn't think it was such a good idea. At the time I didn't understand why, but as time went on I grew to understand. A year and another school later, a girl I had known for quite a while was also pregnant. Neither of these girls was sent away from their schools and neither seemed to have to change their school habits. Their pregnancies were not celebrated by the school but they were also not shunned.
A few weeks ago while vacationing on the white sand beaches of Wichita Kansas, I came across a tolerable radio station. The dj's were discussing something that caught my ear. A woman in a nearby town was putting up a fight over her childs yearbook. She was very irate that in the highschool yearbook there was a 2 page spread featuring 2 pregnant students. It had pics of their bellies, their babies, and sonograms.
Should these girls have been feature stories in their yearbook? UH no.. Are you kidding.. This has 1. nothing to do with school and 2. is not something that should be promoted. The mother who started the anti yearbook fight called into the show, oh did it hit the fan. She couldn't understand why kids like hers who were in extra curricular activities were hidden in the back but these girls were proudly out in front. Good question. She brought up a few other issues she had as well. Another feature story was on piercings and tattoos.
Do piercings and tattoos have a place in a feature story in a year book, eh probably not so much although these penetration stories aren't quite as bad as the other. (sorry) What was bad was the kids they quoted in this feature. One said his father told him he couldn't have a tattoo, but he got one anyway and now his dad can't do anything about it. Another kid said in regards to piercings that they are too expensive to have done by professionals and that kids that want them should do them themselves! Holy crap..
What happened to the days of Most Likely to Succeed, Best Hair, etc.? We now have Most likely to get knocked up, Most likely to get HIV from a hand me down piercing needle? We now hide our athletic, outgoing, intelligent kids in the back so that we make sure the knocked up chick doesn't feel left out?? What is going on in our schools?