...and no, they aren't giving out her number. So don't ask.

It was for their friend.

Maybe they've hit on something - get all the grown-ups rambling on about how swell sex is, and the kids will be so grossed-out they'll keep it in their pants until they know what the heck they're doing. It's brilliance, I tells ya.

Better make sure it's the 55-year-old math teacher with a combover doing this, and not the 22-year-old hottie in home ec.

She had this angled mirror over her food-prep space that used to give a superb view down her blouse. Good times.

/good times until you got called up to the front of the class while sporting a hard-on you could cut glass with, anyway

Gulper Eel: /good times until you got called up to the front of the class while sporting a hard-on you could cut glass with, anyway

Awkward!

GO AMERICA?

Only one eleven year old? See, that was a big furor over nothing.

So far 1 student has asked....


Couldn't be because 11-16 year olds are so damned responsible, could it?

Gulper Eel: 55-year-old math teacher with a combover

WHORE!!!

I can't see how this is a surprise at all. Asking for that stuff from school faculty when you're in middle school is probably really embarrassing (OMG, does the teacher know? Does she think I'm a total slut?). Not to mention most sex ed classes in this country are urged to continue spreading misinformation about the efficacy of birth control methods. Perhaps Maine has a more evolved attitude towards teaching sex ed, but still, it shouldn't be a surprise.

why doesn't she have a seat right ove... wait

It couldn't possibly be because the whole "teens are having massive sex ZOMG JEEZUS" argument is completely overblown and in not any way true?

/18 year old
//did not get laid in middle school
///or most of high school, for that matter

Go Maine???!!!

Good, even if it only helps one, that's one less teenager having babies.

good on her. One (or more) less baby that her mom/grandmom/state has to care for. I don't see a problem with this.

Maybe only one student asked but she is a very, very, very popular student.

How is giving prescription drugs to kids without a prescription even allowed?

The teachers' contract prevents the school board from releasing the number of teachers who have asked.

Benjimin_Dover: How is giving prescription drugs to kids without a prescription even allowed?

It's not a prescription.

I support these programs but putting a 14-year-old on hormone drugs seems like an extraordinarily bad idea because of the potential health consequences.

Benjimin_Dover: How is giving prescription drugs to kids without a prescription even allowed?

Condoms are birth control. You may be thinking by birth control they mean the pill.

Kome: Condoms are birth control. You may be thinking by birth control they mean the pill.

Maybe RTFA?

Infamousg

FTFA: "For all the media firestorm surrounding the decision to make prescription contraceptives available at King Middle School"

did she get preggers?

...and now I have another reason to lol at uberconservatives who piss and moan about ideas like this (and sort of... shrug at its supporters.)

Why don't they realize that just because the county is over sexualized that they do not have to push this idea on kids.

Like they were going to go to the school nurse for something like that

vodka: I support these programs but putting a 14-year-old on hormone drugs seems like an extraordinarily bad idea because of the potential health consequences.

I was put on hormonal b.c. at the age of 12. NO, not b/c I was promiscuous. It's hardly very sexy, but I had ovarian cysts that were causing me to have horrific menstrual periods.

There are non-sex-related reasons to give pre-teens b.c., and it's safe if the girl is examined and monitored by a doctor.

Much as I do not agree w/ it, teenagers are going to have sex. We may as well keep them from 1. contracting an STD (condom) and/or 2. becoming pregnant w/in a monogamous relationship (hormonal bc).

dervish16108: Gulper Eel: Better make sure it's the 55-year-old math teacher with a combover doing this



"How do I reach these keedz!?"

that episode was classic.

The Whore Of Mensa: vodka: I support these programs but putting a 14-year-old on hormone drugs seems like an extraordinarily bad idea because of the potential health consequences.

I was put on hormonal b.c. at the age of 12. NO, not b/c I was promiscuous. It's hardly very sexy, but I had ovarian cysts that were causing me to have horrific menstrual periods.

There are non-sex-related reasons to give pre-teens b.c., and it's safe if the girl is examined and monitored by a doctor.

Much as I do not agree w/ it, teenagers are going to have sex. We may as well keep them from 1. contracting an STD (condom) and/or 2. becoming pregnant w/in a monogamous relationship (hormonal bc).

oh dear lord why

It came out in a thread last year about the morning after pill that despite all the hate-filled rhetoric making it available did not have any effect -- young women weren't more slutty or less pregnant overall.

vodka: I support these programs but putting a 14-year-old on hormone drugs seems like an extraordinarily bad idea because of the potential health consequences.

OMG you're right - I'm sure no one anywhere in the world has ever done exhaustive, fully reviewed studies spanning decades on this very question.

Side effects can certainly suck, but after half a century your vague 'bad idea' feeling just indicates you have better things to do than research the carefully documented and well known facts on the issue.

This is an interesting debate. Perhaps New Mexico is just depraved, but in my home town anyone could go to the County Health Office at the courthouse and pick up a "brown bag special." About two dozen condoms, with no provisions made for age, no attempt to talk them out of it, and with the expectation of complete confidentiality.

It always seemed reasonable to me. There is no power on Earth that can stop all the teenagers from screwing all the time. Pitting yourself against teenage hormones is slightly less futile than taking on the tide with a sieve. And at least this way there's less disease and fewer little bastards running around.

oh dear lord why

sorry. hey, think about how much fun that was for me.

>>Maybe only one student asked but she is a very, very, very popular student.

More likely, she is being abused at home by a relative.

I live in Maine and have seen the national media blow this all out of proportion. Way to go, right wing crazies...

I lost my virginity at fourteen so I'm really getting a kick out of these replies.

I still remember him telling me excuse after excuse for why he didn't want to wear a condom. My response? "Condom or I go home."

If only all 14 year old girls were as stubborn as I was then.

vodka: Kome: Condoms are birth control. You may be thinking by birth control they mean the pill.

Maybe RTFA?

My bad totally. I focused on the paragraph way down:
Nationally, about a quarter of school-based health clinics serving adolescents provide some type of contraceptive, usually condoms, and most of those are high schools, according to the National Assembly on School Based Health Care.

And forgot the first few. Oops.

captivity: I lost my virginity at fourteen so I'm really getting a kick out of these replies.
I still remember him telling me excuse after excuse for why he didn't want to wear a condom. My response? "Condom or I go home."
If only all 14 year old girls were as stubborn as I was then.

No kidding. You're the type of person who'd go ask the school for birth control. 99% of other girls wouldn't, even if they were screwing every guy in town.

It's a full service clinic so they're very likely doing the full checkup before giving her the pill. Go Maine!

Making all birth control methods available to teens is a good idea, especially served up with a dose of education. Although I still think a free clinic (in a highly accessible by transit location) with a full range of services is best, it's great to have complementary programs in schools that will encourage teens to get medical attention if they need it, and get them in a pattern of having a medical support system throughout their lives.

People who have a problem with teenagers having medical attention easily accessible to them in the environment they spend most of their time in are idiots. As are the ones who want to legislate to remove the right of someone under 18 to make their own medical decisions about birth control. Confidentiality is crucial to people accessing medical care and by the time you're a teenager, you're much more informed about your own health and well-being than your parents. Also, most girls when I was a teen who were on birth control were on it not for having tons of sex, but for hormone regulation that kept things like acne and difficult periods in line. One friend who went on the pill at 14 didn't lose it until 16, for example.


I'm also glad to hear only one student asked for the pill. It is responsible, but isn't for everyone. Plus, a doctor can clear up the idiotic questions about STDs and pregnancy that teens inevitably have, despite their being a huge internet out there with way more information they could possibly want.

Jedoc: This is an interesting debate. Perhaps New Mexico is just depraved, but in my home town anyone could go to the County Health Office at the courthouse and pick up a "brown bag special." About two dozen condoms, with no provisions made for age, no attempt to talk them out of it, and with the expectation of complete confidentiality.

Here the local HD will give you a pile of them too. At the mental health place I used to work at they'd give the patients a pile of condoms before they were discharged. (no pun intended)

Radar1980: WHORE!!!

"SLUT!!!" would have also been acceptable.

the voices in your head:
It couldn't possibly be because the whole "teens are having massive sex ZOMG JEEZUS" argument is completely overblown and in not any way true?

Oh I think something is "overblown" these days and it is "teenage boys" :P

Gulper Eel:
Better make sure it's the 55-year-old math teacher with a combover doing this, and not the 22-year-old hottie in home ec.

She had this angled mirror over her food-prep space that used to give a superb view down her blouse. Good times.

Hahaha, you sh*t, our home ec teacher was a bitter, disdainful lump who terrorized us with the Four Food Groups, creating a fear and hatred of cooking that it took me years to get over. The pinnacle of the whole damn year was making jam once (I dropped mine, which I guess wasn't her fault) - and maybe throwing away the shiatty sweatshirt we had to make.

Caturday Lover: Go Maine???!!!

That.

Stay classy Maine.

Given the economy, this is a career move.

OMG, but if they make birth control available all the kids will start having sex!!!11!

StillH2O: OMG, but if they make birth control available all the kids will start having sex!!!11!

OMG! Parents actually give a damn about their kids, don't want them to take prescription drugs without permission, and hope to encourage them to avoid actions that can give them diseases they'll have for the rest of their lives!

How DARE we, as parents, make decisions for our children who - by all legal standards - can't make responsible decisions themselves.

What a farked up society.

Where I live we need a doctor's perscription, is this different in Maine?

I remember when a friend of mine lost her virginity at around 17, she asked if I could buy her condoms because she was too embarrassed.

I was still a virgin at the time but I bought them for her. Personally, I believe that if you are so immature that you are embarrassed to buy condoms, you probably are too immature to be sexually active.

What a fuss you silly Muricans can make about a bit of sex. In France, the morning-after pill, "Plan B", is not only sold without prescription in pharmacies, but any girl saying she's a minor and she needs it has the box offered to her. No questions asked, no proof of age or ID requested.
The costs are shared by the sécurité sociale, and the hypothetical frauds, if any, can only represent a tiny amount of the benefits of the program in teen pregnancies that don't happen.

The freedom, free-ness and anonymity were required by family planning associations to prevent the potential moral blackmail of kids in an extremely vulnerable position by "family values" groups/cults like "Concerned Mothers Against Orgasm" or the "Christian Civic League of Maine", in short, what is happening in TFA.