Should little girls in 6th grade be receiving birth control pills from their school? Should parents be notified if so? Are American public schools infringing on a parents right to raise a child according to the parents own beliefs system and moral values?
The most interesting thing I see in this story is that 5 kids admitted to having sexual intercourse at King. Is the school board’s decision a total overreaction to a very small minority of students having sex? Is the overreaction an intentional assault on family values?
PORTLAND, Maine - After an outbreak of pregnancies among middle school girls, education officials in this city have decided to allow one school's health center to make birth control pills available to girls as young as 11.
King Middle School will become the first middle school in Maine to make a full range of contraception available, including birth control pills, patches and condoms. There are no national figures on how many middle schools provide such services. Most middle schoolers range in age from 11 to 13.
"It's very rare that middle schools do this," said Divya Mohan, a spokeswoman for the National Assembly on School-Based Health Care.
Portland's three middle schools reported 17 pregnancies during the last four years, not counting miscarriages or terminated pregnancies that weren't reported to the school nurse.
The Portland School Committee approved the plan, offered by city health officials, on a 7-2 vote Wednesday night. Whether the prescriptions would be offered this school year or next wasn't immediately clear.
King is the only one of the three schools with a health center, primarily because it has more students who get free or reduced-price lunch, said Lisa Belanger, who oversees Portland's student health centers.
Five of the 134 students who visited King's health center during the 2006-07 school year reported having sexual intercourse, said Amanda Rowe, lead nurse in Portland's school health centers.
Italics are mine
Michelle Malkin’s analysis is here.
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