Community Challenge Grant (Teen Pregnancy Prevention)

 California Comprehensive Sexuality Education compliance check list 

Current research supports the approach of the Napa County Office of Education's program to reduce teen pregnancies, sexually transmitted infections, and equip teens with the necessary tools needed to make responsible decisions that will affect their future.

Teens need to have current, accurate information about sexual health issues. The curriculum for 7th graders is an abstinence-only modified program named Postponing Sexual Involvement. It is a 8-plus hour interactive curriculum designed to give students information and tools to think about, discuss and practice helpful techniques to resist societal, media and peer pressures to become sexually active. The material addresses issues of self-awareness and the importance of building self-esteem to become more confident in making healthy decisions. The other components of the curriculum are to ensure compliance of the California Comprehensive Sexual Health and HIV/AIDS Prevention Education Act of 2004.

The program also offers presentations to parents,students, school personnel and community members in English and Spanish to create awareness about the issue and the risks and consequences of teen pregnancy.

The Community Challenge Grant (CCG) Program is a wide-scale, community-driven teen pregnancy prevention program that utilizes a variety of approaches and strategies to: reduce teenage and unintended pregnancy and absentee fatherhood; promote responsible parenting; and increase the involvement of fathers in the economic, social, and emotional development of their children. The heart of the CCG Program lies in the fundamental premise that community-driven approaches to teen pregnancy increase community ownership of solutions.

Since this program was instituted in 1999, Napa County has seen a decline in teen pregnancies and an increase in teens intent to change behavior to protect themselves, either by choosing to be sexually abstinent until they are ready for that involvement, or using pregnancy and disease prevention techniques more consistently and effectively.

Students receive Family Life/Sex Education usually in 7th grade. Each school has a program for delivering material to students that includes parent preview of materials, parent permission to participate in the curriculum, interactive lessons to help students understand the material and handouts to help students involve their parents in what they are learning.

For more information about the project, please contact:

Vicka Llamas, Project Coordinator