Advocating for Policies to Prevent Teen Pregnancy & STIs

Initiating a Community Readiness Assessment process to support distribution of condoms to youth in Milwaukee

Full Project Name:Advocating for Model Policies that Support Teen Pregnancy/STI Prevention Activities in MilwaukeePrimary Community Organization:Diverse and ResilientPrimary Academic Partner:Carol Galletly, PhD, Psychiatry and Behavioral MedicineAward Amount:$220,575

Award Date

July2015

Project Duration:9 months

Project Description Narrative:

Seeking to address high rates of teen pregnancy and sexually transmitted infections in Milwaukee, project partners sought to create and advocate for the adoption of model policies within Milwaukee Public Schools (MPS) as well as other Milwaukee schools and youth-serving agencies to support the distribution of condoms by youth health workers to their peers. By initiating a Community Readiness Assessment process, partners sought to identify community readiness for identified model policies to support distribution of condoms to youth in schools and other youth-serving agencies.

Community partners: City of Milwaukee Health Department, Planned Parenthood, Teen Pregnancy Prevention Collaborative, United Way of Greater Milwaukee and Waukesha County, Wisconsin Department of Public Instruction

414ALL partners: COA Youth and Family Centers, Pathfinders, PEARLS for Teen Girls, Running Rebels, Sixteenth Street Community Health Center, YMCA/YWCA

Outcomes & Lessons Learned:

Due to restrictions by the Milwaukee Public Schools (MPS) institutional review board (IRB), Community Readiness Assessment (CRA) interviews were unable to be completed with MPS employees. Therefore, project partners were unable to proceed with completing a full CRA and the project ended early after leveraging over $23,000 in additional funds.