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How babies can focus the mind
With UK teenage pregnancy rates still the highest in western Europe, Biddy Passmore reports on attempts to tackle the issue
PREGNANT schoolgirls can be so keen to get their GCSEs before they succumb to motherhood that they have finished exams while in the early stages of labour.
At Coningsby pupil-referral unit in the south London borough of Croydon, staff enquired anxiously about the interval between contractions as a keen mother-to-be completed her English GCSE.
“She did well,” said Sue Podd, director of the unit. She was referring to the GCSE result but the baby was fine too.
Coningsby staff find that schoolgirl mothers are their most highly motivated group. “Even if they weren’t particularly motivated before, pregnancy does tend to focus the mind,” said Mrs Podd. “I’m not recommending it though,” she added quickly.
The unit was one of the pioneers of education for schoolgirl mothers, starting special courses for them 20 years ago. Staff are determined that having a baby should not wreck a teenager’s education.
The unit runs morning sessions for up to 12 schoolgirl mothers at its cramped Cotelands site and hopes soon to offer them full-time classses, adding visits and exercise classes to the academic courses.
Girls are eligible for a place as soon as their pregnancy is confirmed and can return after the birth, when their babies are looked after in the unit’s nursery.
The youngest girls (Coningsby’s youngest so far was 12) eventually return to full-time school. But the majority, in Years 10 and 11, stay at the unit until they are 16. Most take five GCSEs (English, maths, science, child development and art) and have access to vocational education and work experience.
When they leave, some become full-time mothers. But a good proportion carry on in education. Last year, five out of 11 leavers went on to further education college.
Three teenage mums from Coningsby went to Downing Street last year to see the Prime Minister launch the Government’s teenage pregnancy strategy. They ranged from a very bright middle-class girl who had become pregnant in the middle of her A-levels, to a girl in care. “It can happen to anyone,” said Mrs Podd.