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Community Education and Advocacy

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Community Education and Advocacy

Introduction

Community education and advocacy help to bring awareness to society and address

social issues within the society. Community education consolidates its members in society by

teaching them the values and morals of the society while equipping them with skills necessary to

function in economic activities. Advocacy provides a chance to community members to

communicate their views to change policy resulting in a system change. Advocacy agents look

for evidence to make their case in order to compel change. Advocates influences change within

the political, economic, and social systems.

Teenage Pregnancy

Teenage pregnancies are a social issue that brings negative consequences to teenagers

and their families. The main cause of teenage pregnancy is, insufficient sexual education,

inadequate parental care, and communication, peer pressure, and poverty among other factors. In

many cases, the pregnancy is unplanned and unwanted and they are also prone to complications.

This is a contributing factor to high maternal mortality in both obstetric complications and unsafe

abortion (Odland, 2018). Teenagers are prone to making wrong choices without thinking about

the consequences of their actions which end up affecting them, their families, and society

negatively. The pregnancy causes the teenager to put their plans on hold until the baby is born

for example going to college. Pregnant young teenagers might be rejected by their families and

friends which causes low self-esteem and self-worth which can lead to depression and mental

health problems. Teenage pregnancies increase the financial burden on their families because

they cannot support themselves financially. Their families especially their parents feel
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disappointed because it makes them rearrange their lives to include a new family member.

Teenage pregnancy is a causation factor of low educational attainment and low income for

teenage mothers. It also causes a loss of revenue for the government because of increased costs

in healthcare and foster care. Teenage pregnancy is linked with higher social-economic

disadvantage, mental health issues, and substance abuse (Wong et al., 2020).

Advocating for Teenage Pregnancy

Human service professionals encounter a lot of challenges in ensuring the healthy and

positive development of all youth (Mohr et al., 2019). Social workers can help to reduce teenage

pregnancy by advocating for the attainment of higher education levels among teenagers.

Uneducated teenagers are more likely to get pregnant because they do not have the necessary

knowledge on how it can have negative impacts on their life, their families, and society.

Teenagers with lower levels of education or who are not in school are more likely to get pregnant

(Mohr et al., 2019). Human service professionals can advocate for support systems for families

which cannot afford tuition money by helping them acquire scholarships. They should also be

engaged in the community school systems to help enact policies that will lead to the attainment

of quality education which will equip teenagers with the necessary skills for life.

Counseling teenagers is another way social workers can advocate for teenage

pregnancy. According to Hoefer (2019), advocacy is a problem-solving technique therefore

teenagers should be educated about reproductive health, the risk of unprotected sex, sexually

transmitted infections (STIs), and early pregnancy. Social workers should form groups where

they will provide teenagers with sex information. Community members, families, and teenagers

should all be engaged in the topic of teenage pregnancy without any resistance and prejudice.

Teenagers feel that confidentiality in sexual and reproductive health is important and appreciate
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relationships with providers that are friendly and nonjudgmental (Berlan et al., 2020). Social

workers should ensure they give all the necessary information required to provide the teenagers

with all the knowledge on how to become responsible members of society. Counseling will go a

long way in helping to curb teenage pregnancies since each teenager both girls and boys will be

made to understand how their future will be affected if it happened to them.

Community Education Strategies

Community education is a reliable process in a community developed with

understanding and sustained by participation to build new awareness and concepts to improve

the quality of life of the community (Ardiwinata & Mulyono, 2018). Community education

provides support to community members by solving their social problems such as educational

needs through education. Human service professionals can use community education forums to

spread awareness about teenage pregnancies. Social workers can organize workshops where

community workers will engage through conversation on how they can eradicate teenage

pregnancies. Workshops will provide information to teenagers, parents, and the community

while teaching teenagers safe sexual behaviors. Workshops will enhance collaboration with all

the stakeholders in the community making it easier to prevent the vice and spread awareness.

Effectiveness of Community Education and Advocacy

Community education and advocacy are effective ways of addressing teenage

pregnancies. Community education equips its community members with personal skills, and

strengths, and provides awareness on how it can be applied to help them plan their future.

Teenagers are advised on how to practice safe sex. Through community education, families and

members of the community are provided with the necessary information which will come in
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handy when guiding to help the youth to make better choices involving sexual behaviors. On the

other hand, advocacy helps to bring change by influencing policy at a level at which the

community might not have the power or resources to do so. Advocacy will help to spread

awareness that teenage pregnancy is not only a personal problem but a societal problem as well.

Getting the attention of, local representatives, large organizations, and governments is a complex

and hard prospect however advocates have the knowledge and skills as well as methods of how

to reach them. This can help in acquiring funds to organize workshops to provide awareness and

counseling and also pay for school fees for needy families.

Teenage Pregnancy Prevention Organizations

Teen Pregnancy & Prevention Partnership (TPPT) is an organization that promotes

teenage sexual health and teen pregnancy prevention. According to the organization’s website,

the organization uses advocacy, collaboration, and training to create public awareness. The

organization raises awareness of the impact of teen pregnancies and sexually transmitted

infections (STIs) on teenage sexual health and provides strategies to improve the health

outcomes of teenagers. This organization has proved that advocacy can help the issue of teenage

pregnancy get recognition countrywide by creating awareness countrywide and providing

support. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) conducts community-wide initiatives

in collaboration with the federal Office of Adolescent Health (OAH) and Office of Population

Affairs (OPA) to educate and show the effectiveness of community-wide initiatives in reducing

teenage pregnancy. They mobilize the community and provide training, education, and engage

all sectors of the population to address teen pregnancy prevention.

Conclusion

Teenagers are the future of every society therefore it is important to ensure their future

is not jeopardized by factors like teenage pregnancy. Community education is a means of

ensuring that each member of society gives their opinions on issues and provides ideas on how to

solve societal problems like teenage pregnancy while being educated at the same time. Advocacy

provides a platform where the community is allowed to take part in the decision-making of

important matters in society and create awareness within the community itself and also outside

community boundaries.
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References

Ardiwinata, J. S., & Mulyono, D. (2018). Community Education in the development of The

Community. EMPOWERMENT: Jurnal Ilmiah Program Studi Pendidikan Luar

Sekolah, 7(1), 25-35.

http://e-journal.stkipsiliwangi.ac.id/index.php/empowerment/article/view/661

Berlan, E. D., Richards, M. J., Vieira, C. S., Creinin, M. D., Kaunitz, A. M., Fraser, I. S.,

Edelman, A., & Mansour, D. (2020). Best practices for counseling adolescents about the

Etonogestrel implant. Journal of Pediatric and Adolescent Gynecology, 33(5), 448-

454. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jpag.2020.06.022

Hoefer, R. (2019). Advocacy practice for social justice. Oxford University Press, USA.

Mohr, R., Carbajal, J., & Sharma, B. B. (2019). The influence of educational attainment on

teenage pregnancy in low-income countries: A systematic literature review. Journal of

Social Work in the Global Community, 4(1). https://doi.org/10.5590/jswgc.2019.04.1.02

Odland, J. (2018). Teenage reproductive health: Pregnancy, contraception, unsafe abortion,

fertility. International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health, 15(6),

1176. https://doi.org/10.3390/ijerph15061176

Wong, S. P., Twynstra, J., Gilliland, J. A., Cook, J. L., & Seabrook, J. A. (2020). Risk factors

and birth outcomes associated with teenage pregnancy: A Canadian sample. Journal of

Pediatric and Adolescent Gynecology, 33(2), 153-

159. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jpag.2019.10.006