Word: pregnant
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...When my TIME colleague Katie Kingsbury first quoted Gloucester principal Joseph Sullivan as saying the reason pregnancies at his school quadrupled this year was that a group of sophomore girls "made a pact to get pregnant and raise their babies together," the story made headlines from here to Australia - but no one could agree on what it meant. If only Massachusetts hadn't rejected federal funds for "abstinence only" education, lamented Tony Perkins of the Family Research Council. If only the school health clinic had been allowed to dispense birth control pills, countered its medical director Dr. Brian...
...that some had reacted to positive test results with high fives and plans for baby showers. Pathways for Children CEO Sue Todd, whose organization runs the school's on-site daycare center, told TIME on June 13 that its social worker had heard of the girls' plan to get pregnant as early as last fall. She noted that some of the girls involved had been identified as being at risk of becoming a teen mother as early as sixth grade, when they began to request pregnancy tests in middle school. "What we've seen is the girls fit a certain...
...June 11, the mayor and the school's superintendent, Christopher Farmer, said that some of the sophomores at Gloucester High appeared to be getting pregnant on purpose. Farmer said today he now believes that some of the girls who were already pregnant decided to band together to stay in school and raise their babies together. He added that if he had previously known of the pact as described by Sullivan, there would have been a schoolwide intervention earlier. (See the people who mattered...
None of the rising juniors TIME identified as being members of the pact have come forward publicly, but nine Gloucester High students have talked to TIME about the girls who decided to get pregnant. Some described the pregnant teens as having little parental supervision. "They could stay out all night if they wanted," says a classmate, whose parents requested that she not be identified by name. Others noted a herd mentality. "I think the plan was a lot about peer pressure," says Nicole Jewell, a rising junior who describes herself as being friends with some of the girls involved...
...girls make a formal pact to get pregnant together or not? Without comment from any of the pregnant students themselves, it may be impossible to determine exactly what they agreed to, and when. So far, the only school official to use the word pact is Sullivan, who reportedly now says he does not recall who told him about the pact in the first place. But what does seem clear based on TIME's reporting is that some of the girls in question did at least discuss the idea of getting pregnant at the same time, and that too little...