The EmpowHer News Department has been creating fresh updates for you on this shocking story of teen pregnancy.
In this update you'll get more information on the homeless man who impregnated one of the 16-year-old girls, what the High School Principal told Time Magazine, how the movie Juno affected the girls decision and if Jamie Lynn Spears' pregnancy was an influence.
MORE ON THE HOMELESS MAN?
Teachers and supervisors don’t understand why the girls would want to get pregnant so desperately, and the school was appalled when it learned that one baby was fathered by a 24-year-old homeless man. A student at the high school who had a baby last year, says that girls frequently commented on how lucky she was and thinks that her peers want to get pregnant because “They're so excited to finally have someone to love them unconditionally.”
http://www.findingdulcinea.com/news/health/May-June-08/Teens-in-Gloucest...
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WHAT DID THE PRINCIPAL TELL TIME MAGAZINE?
Gloucester High School Principal Joseph Sullivan told Time magazine in a story published this week that the girls had confessed to making the pact after the school began investigating a rise in pregnancies that has left 17 girls at the school carrying a child. Normally, there are four pregnancies a year at the school.
Sullivan told Time nearly half of the expecting pupils, none older than 16, were involved. He said pupils were coming to the school clinic multiple times for pregnancy tests, and "seemed more upset when they weren't pregnant than when they were".
http://www.theherald.co.uk/news/foreign/display.var.2356101.0.High_schoo...
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Is it coincidence that Jamie Lynn Spears (17) just had a baby?
JACKSON, Mississippi -- Jamie Lynn Spears has had a full day and night to bond with her baby.
She gave birth yesterday morning to a daughter she's named Maddie Briann.
http://www.nbc5i.com/entertainment/16666734/detail.html
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Did the girls have low self esteem?
"The general theory is that these are young women who have poor self-esteem. They do not have a lot of affection in their lives and, at the same time, they believe they will gain some affection by having a baby," Farmer said.
Another theory, put forward by Time Magazine, is that Gloucester High "has done perhaps too good a job of embracing young mothers," providing them with on-site childcare and healthcare facilities.
http://afp.google.com/article/ALeqM5gqy7Ul-khsyXZbncPC3S4FgOn4aw
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"A typical girl you would think would say, 'Oh my God! What am I going to do now? How am I going to support this baby? How am I going to finish school?'" Superintendent Christopher Farmer said. "These young women clearly have not seen that."
http://www.news8.net/news/stories/0608/530026.html
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JUNO & JAMIE LYNN SPEARS
Just this week, 17-year-old TV star Jamie Lynn Spears, the unmarried sister of Britney Spears, gave birth. "Juno," a wry comedy about a 16-year-old girl who gets pregnant, was one of the most acclaimed movies of the year.
"Baby bumps get written about the same way designer handbags do. It's just one more lifestyle choice, just another personal expression: these shoes, this bump and that handbag," Brown said. "It's not surprising that teenage girls can get confused or even seduced by the allure of celebrity pregnancy."
http://ap.google.com/article/ALeqM5g798CHaazwkE1E0TMQv8AZ60Bj1wD91E2OD00