ABSTRACT
As someone who is involved in working with young women and invested in creating effective and equitable educational policies, I often find myself mired in the dilemmas and tensions of how to interpret data, take account of public sentiment and develop effective policy. Nowhere have I found this more difficult than in my research on teen pregnancy. Teen pregnancy has captured national attention as a personal and political issue and created a call for reform that Constance Nathanson characterizes as a ‘minor industry in the US’ (1991:145). Billed as an indication of ‘a failure of American society’ (NCHS, 1992), teen pregnancy is increasingly described as a problem of epidemic proportions and is portrayed as a defining example of what is morally and socially wrong in American society today.
