PHC6534 : Teen Pregnancy Prevention with a Trauma Focus Lens in Alachua County

Even though teen pregnancy in the United States is declining, there is still 15.4 births for every 1,000 female teens from 15-19, including 100 teen pregnancies in Alachua, Florida (HHS, 2023). Teens who are most at risk of teen pregnancy mostly come from traumatic backgrounds, with many adverse childhood events or experiences such as physical or sexual violence, neglectful homes, poverty, mental health conditions (Shreffler, 2021 & Rubin, 1999). Teen pregnancy not only has negative effects on the teen, but the child, and the family as a whole, including, low birthweight, postpartum depression, societal stress, higher likelihood of not finishing school, and poverty (Maheshwari, 2022). Because of these risk factors, a trauma informed approached is important when crafting an interventions to lessen the likelihood of at risk teens from becoming pregnant. In my grant proposal, I laid out a plan to create a safe physical space for teens to study and get tutoring and with the help of older peer mentors, hold classes to increase self efficacy and knowledge around finishing high school, obtaining higher education, and comprehensive sexual education, along with building community support.

Trauma-informed principles

A goal of these proposed intervention is meeting the 6 principles of peer support, trustworthiness/transparency, collaboration, empowerment, safety, and cultural issues. Of peer support and cultural awareness, my plan includes the use of older female young adults from the Alachua community with similar backgrounds of the participants. Of transparency, participants will be told before entering the intervention that data will be collected for quality insurance as well as the expectations of the program. Empowerment will be encouraged through encouraging participants to use and share the knowledge the learn from the program to better their lives, achieve higher education. Collaboration will be encouraged between team members as well as the team and the participants to improve program events and planning. Having a physical location for program events, classes, and open study hours will provided a physical safe space for teens to eat, hang out with friends, and do homework outside of their possible violent or traumatic homes.

Level of the social ecological model

Being that this intervention is focused on increasing self efficacy and knowledge, this intervention is designed to focus on the individual level of the socio-ecological model. Through the monthly classes, participants will gain skills and knowledge to increase self efficacy about possible career paths, paths to higher education, interview, resume building skills, along with safe sex education, and domestic violence classes. Being increasing knowledge building, this intervention in targeting the intrapersonal/interpersonal/individual level of the social ecological model.

Public health framework

Using the public health framework, this intervention is looking at teen pregnancy as a health condition and addressing the social determinants of health, mainly the economic stability and education access. Teens who get pregnant are less likely to purse higher education and lack of education is a risk factor as well (Rubin, 1999). Low socioeconomic status is a risk factor as well, including being financially dependent of a partner (Rubin, 1999). Being that education level is associated with economic status, a goal of the intervention is to positively affect both by encouraging higher education and financial independence. Being that economic status is being building into the framework of this intervention, funds for the program would be used to provide extracurricular team building activities at a free or reduced cost.

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