INTRODUCTION I chose to write on this topic because it had become a very touchy subject to nearly most parents. Every parent’s greatest fear is hearing about how their beloved little princess utters the words “I’m pregnant”, or how their golden boy tells them about the possibility that he “might have gotten a girl pregnant.” It intrigues me to know that there are people out there younger than I that are playing the role of a mother or father (or at least trying to) whereas my greatest priority as of the moment is my education. Personally, my mother was a teenage parent, however; in her time and society teenage pregnancy confirmed with the social norms making teenage pregnancy socially acceptable. Times have changed, and in our modern society, parenthood is delayed up until adulthood. I have had friends, peers, and even family members that have gone through the process of teenage parenthood. Most frequently, I have seen much of this activity in a high school setting, and have been in great shock every time. It is a very eye opening topic to discuss about because it can happen to nearly anyone living in the United States in the twenty-first century. In our modern society, sex is a very open topic and is nearly encouraged by anyone to “experiment” it prior to making any form of commitment that is, as long as you are having “safe sex.” Teenage dropout rates are at a high when the subject of teenage pregnancy comes into play. I want to take a deeper look into this topic and really look at how becoming a parent at such a young age affect the life of a high school student. This is a sad but true reality of today’s generation. It is a lot for a kid to deal with at such a young age especially since most of these kids are still trying to figure out for themselves who they are as a person because they have not experienced life yet or fully matured. REVIEW OF THE LITERATURE 1. The first article was called “The Dropout Crisis and Teen Pregnancy” by Olivia Marshall. According to Ms. Marshall, only 51 percent of teen moms earn a high school diploma versus the 89 percent who did not have a child before reaching the age of 18 who have a high school diploma. Olivia states that balancing time for education while taking care of a new born baby is nearly impossible for high school students which is why so many choose to dropout. She also claims in her article that students who are most academically involved have less of a chance of getting pregnant in high school than their peers who aren’t as involved. In other words, the ones who do drop out “just because” have an even greater chance of getting pregnant. In her article she also finds that teen