SCHOOL STUDIES TEEN PREGNANCY; TEEN MOMS FEEL PRESSURE TO DROP OUT

About 20 percent of the students who dropped out of Cape Girardeau Central High School this year were pregnant or were parents.

Members of a committee studying the school district's dropout problem and what can be done shared that and other information with the Board of Education at a study session Thursday.

The committee's initial report was presented to the board at its regular May meeting. Information presented Thursday reflected additional analyses of statistics the committee has begun to collect about dropouts.

Cape Girardeau public schools have a dropout rate of about 18 percent: 117 students dropped out so far this school year; 15 dropped out twice.

The committee has discovered that pregnancy or teen parenting is a common denominator among dropouts.

Information collected by the high-school nurse during this school year showed 27 students at Central were known to be pregnant and 11 dropped out. Eight dropped out after their babies were born and three dropped out while still pregnant.

This school year 11 girls delivered babies, 13 are still pregnant, and three terminated their pregnancies.

Also this school year 15 teen moms started school and 11 have dropped out.

Twenty-three students at Central have one child, four others have two children, and four others have three children.

At the junior high, pregnancy was related to just one dropout. But Gerald Richards, assistant principal at the junior high, said nine girls six ninth-graders and three eighth-graders have been pregnant this year. Eight were still attending school the first of May. Two delivered babies and returned to school, two terminated their pregnancies, and four are still pregnant.

Carolyn Vandeven, principal at L.J. Schultz Middle School, said one girl started the seventh grade this year as the mother of two children. She is still in school because she is not eligible to drop out; she's too young.

Board president Pat Ruopp said: "We have a tremendous job of education with these young women. They have no idea what they're in for."

Pat Bratton, Central High counselor, said: "Pregnancy is not the problem; it's taking care of the baby and going to school and work and just living that is the problem."

Students stay at home six weeks after delivery and participate in a homebound education program through the school district. It is after that six weeks, when the students return to the regular classroom, that most decide to drop out, Bratton said.

Other warning signs for dropouts, like the number of schools a student has attended or achievement scores, did not establish a clear pattern as pregnancy or teen parenting did.

Another problem administrators cited for Cape Girardeau schools is the number of students living on their own. High-school students move out or are kicked out of their parents' homes, rent apartments or move in with friends.

Interim Superintendent James Englehart said: "We have a unique population because of the number of students who live independently. I'm talking about kids whose parents live in Cape, but the kid doesn't live with the parent.

"When they have to pay rent and utility bills, education is no longer the most important thing in their life."

Central High School Principal Dan Milligan said: "Last spring we had six kids living in a house on South Sprigg; four boys and two girls. Eventually all those kids ended up dropping out."

Englehart said Cape Girardeau tends to attract this type of young person.

"We have a lot of part-time work available here, a lot more than Chaffee or Delta or Jackson or even Sikeston," he said. "I see students every week in August and September who want to enroll here because they have just moved here."

After hearing the information, board member Carolyn Kelley asked, "Where do we fail?"

Bratton responded: "I don't know that we fail. By the time we see them at the high school they have such a bunch of problems at home and at school and sometimes even with the legal system."

She said the answer may be reaching students at a young age to develop self esteem.

"At the high school we try to Band-Aid them and get them through the door," Bratton said. "We need to start at the elementary level or even before."

Englehart said that while the committee is talking about the school district's dropout problem, efforts have been made across the district to try to keep kids in school

He listed as examples in-school suspension at the junior high school and Schultz, Saturday school at the high school, the Students At Risk program at the vocational school, reading recovery and Project Charlie in the elementary schools, Quest at Schultz, and Parents as Teachers for children through 3.

Vandeven, who is also co-chairman of the committee, said the programs that are most effective try to prevent problems rather than fix them.

She said: "Next year the committee will delve into what we are doing, what we are not doing and programs which may work. We hope to come to the board after January with a recommendation."