School Makes Teen Reveal Pregnancy
How far should a school go to get help for a pregnant teen?
A mom in Texas says her daughter’s school crossed a line when they forced the girl to reveal her pregnancy to staff, then sent her for medical testing and counseling.
Considering it’s a Christian school, it’s not surprising the First Choice Pregnancy Center, where they sent the teen, just so happens to be one of those abstinence-only, pro-life organizations. But then the Trinity Christian School allegedly expelled the girl in May of 2008, two weeks shy of the end of school.
The girls mom is suing the school, church and specific staffers at the school. But it sounds like her biggest problems are with the center, which the lawsuit says, “The pregnancy center interviewed, counseled and tested Jane Doe
without the consent or knowledge of her mother and disseminated her
private medical information to [school Bible teacher Shannan] Morgan and [school counselor Brad] Watson without
consent or authorization.”
So there was a violation of HIPAA here on behalf of the center. Her health info should not have been given to school staff based on federal guidelines regarding the privacy of health information. Period.
It’s inappropriate too that the school ordered any form of medical testing, and that the girl was forced to reveal her pregnancy. Again, that’s private health information. Her pregnancy was not swine flu. It was not going to affect public health. It’s where the school clearly crossed a line. As they did by kicking out a student for her pregnancy.
But is the counseling part out of line? Even counseling at a place where they make it their mission “to give women and teens in crisis pregnancies and opportunity to examine their lives, think through their options, and gain vital information regarding positive alternatives to pregnancy termination”?
Remember, this isn’t a public school. As a religious private school, the separation of church and state is null and void. So while parents with kids in public school could (should) throw up their arms for having their kid brought to a faith-based counseling service, that doesn’t necessarily apply here. And counseling of some form is often put into place by school districts, some of which have a psychologist on staff for kids to consult. And that can be at the suggestion of a teacher or simply a student’s own request. If a student or teacher dies, a trauma team full of counselors is called upon, and parents are not asked if that’s OK.
I’d imagine counseling for a pregnant teen is appropriate. Even in a public school setting – although there I’d again call for something non-faith based, with no particular focus on whether or not she’ll keep the baby.
What do you think, parents?
Image: supernannyrules.com (not the girl described)
Related Posts:
The article doesn’t actually spell out that she was expelled because of her pregnancy. However, you’d think that if she was expelled for some other reason, the lawyer for the school might say that to the press, since he is already badmouthing the mother, so it’s not like he’s trying to avoid defamation. I guess we can’t know for sure, though.
I realize that the rules are a bit different for pregnant teens than for minors with other medical conditions, and that pregnant teens have the legal right to control the flow of information about their pregnancies, but that doesn’t necessarily mean that a general waiver that a teen signed when entering school would make it legal for the teen to then be forced to have medical tests that they refused and then to reveal the result of those tests “without consent or authorization”, does it?
I do agree that we are all reading a lot between the lines here. Since the girl herself hasn’t spoken up, we don’t know whether she agreed to all of this or not. If the girl revealed the information voluntarily and without coersion, consented to the testing, consented to the counseling, AND agreed to have her test results released to the school, all without coersion, then I don’t see a legal problem, regardless of the parents’ wishes, but if the girl didn’t freely consent, then I think there is a very big problem indeed.
Sara,
I totally see your point that if they had intended on expelling her were they just trying to feed her a few last thoughts before sending her on her way? I get that. It would be wrong set someone up. My problem is so often we get a partial story and readers are quick to fill in the blanks with theory. Maybe there were other reasons this girl was expelled.
I also work with teen parents and we do have waivers that we use to be allowed to talk with various agencies and school officials. We have a lawyer who oversees all of our forms and proccesses. So far, we have had no issue with waivers signed by minors. It seems to suffice. They do have the option of who they release us to talk to and we are legally responsible for every piece of information we pass on or collect. Verbal approval does not suffice.
As for the comment above this one, I think you were offering an insult to me but I am unable to understand your comment.
Pro abortion just like the separation of church and state is anti religion. I can not take you seriously enough to bring together an appropriate response. Even if a waiver was signed they could not test her without parental permission. Since when does non-religious imply pro-abortion. It is Pro-life and pro-choice or i would accept anti-woman’s-rights(or Misogynistic forced choice) and pro-abortion your choice.
Hear, hear, Janey.
This is ridiculous! I have been speaking out on behalf of teen parents for about 4 years now and I think that despite the choice she made, they shouldn’t have expelled her from school! When I got pregnant with my daughter during high school, they tried to send me to a ‘teen mothers program’. No way in hell were they allowing me to go there, I stayed at my school and graduated with my class!
I have this website dedicated to helping out teens against negative people:
http://voiceforteenparents.blogspot.com
Twyla–I used the term “brain washing” because if their intention was to expel the girl (thus washing their hands of the problem), then that casts serious doubt as to whether they had her best interests at heart when they sent her in for counseling. Those two actions taken together (if, indeed, she was expelled for her pregnancy, as this article implies), suggest that their purpose was to manipulate her, not to help her.
Offering information about some of the available options but not others is also manipulative if the person involved did not actually seek out that type of counseling. I have no problem at all with “pro-life” counseling if it is freely chosen by girls and women who are aware that they have other options and choose to eliminate the option of abortion from consideration before they seek counseling. However, that does not appear to be the situation in this case.
I have never heard of a school “trying to coax an abortion” out of anyone. I agree that any time that an adult tries to push a child into any specific choice about a crisis pregnancy, be that choice parenting, abortion, or placement for adoption, that is wrong. I also agree that some adults favor abortion as a “solution” to teen pregnancy. However, I have a lot of difficulty imagining that any school, public or otherwise, has a policy of encouraging their students to seek abortions. I think you’re fighting with a straw man.
CAN an underage child sign a legally valid waiver or release of information that overrides their HIPAA protections? I doubt it.
Couple of things: if she signed a waiver or release of information then that can override HIPAA laws to some extent. Also, is there any information as to why she got expelled? Sounds like people are jumping to the conclusion that she was expelled for pregnancy but is there proof to that. Why are people so quick to attack religious schools?
My kids are in public school and I would be happy to hear the school wasn’t trying to coax an abortion out of them with thier “non-religious counseling”. That is a two-way street. The “brain washing” that you put on these organizations that are pro-life could also be put on the ones that are pro-abortion. Most pro-life clinics don’t discuss abortions. End of story. They discuss other options as though abortions didn’t exist. That is not brain washing.
What would JESUS do???! He would forgive her. God created church not for the saints, but for the sinners!!! =]
What would Jesus do? Clearly, he would kick her out of school.
I’m assuming HIPAA applies here, despite its being a religious school? I don’t know how that law works.
Also, to add to my previous comment, if they were going to expel the student anyway, then what right did they have to send her to counseling? Clearly they were either trying to brainwash her on the way out of the door, or they were using the outcome to the counseling to make the decision about whether to expel her, which is manipulative and counterproductive to the purposes of counseling. Not cool. I’d be furious.
They sent her to counseling based on the medical information that they should never have obtained. I think that’s wrong. There is a difference between grief counseling, which is an emergency, time-sensitive intervention that probably can’t wait for parental consent, and pregnancy counseling, which presumably could wait 24 hours until the student could bring in a note from home.
did they also expel the father?