The effects of teenage pregnancy on the school life of adolescent girls.

Abstract

This study aims to explore and describe the effects of teenage pregnancy on the school life of teenage mothers who are learners at The High School. It also seeks to generate guidelines which could be useful for educators, programme planners, and other stakeholders involved in designing intervention programmes to help teenage girls avoid unintended pregnancies and those who have fallen into this trap, to be resilient. The sample consists of thirteen learners who were either pregnant or teenage mothers already. The participants were purposively chosen from grades 8-12, two from each grade and five from grade 12. This study uses a qualitative, contextual, descriptive design to investigate the effects the teenage pregnancy has on the lives of girls who fall pregnant while at school. It employs a case study methodology and the data collection instruments included face-to-face interviews and document analysis such as mark schedules and attendance registers. The findings revealed that teenage pregnancy causes tension in the girls' families; the physical changes and experience of pregnancy impacts on their school life; pregnancy causes emotional instability in the teenage girls' lives and their education is indeed disadvantaged. A positive aspect is that there is a chance to make up for the lost time if educational opportunities and support exist. The researcher recommends that there should be support for pregnant girls and teenage mothers within the school system. For this study to have more impact as well as influence policy makers and senior Departmental officials to act upon these recommendations, it is advisable that further research be conducted in other schools to explore the impact of teenage pregnancies on their school life in particular, and schools in general.