This time on Beyond the Report we’re invited along with Louise Anders and Lydia Salas on their pursuit of an education. While one is still a teenager and the other should be settling into retirement, the two share one thing in common: both point to teenage pregnancy as their reason for dropping out of school.
“I’ve been trying to get my GED since 98,” Lydia Salas says. “I go and I pass several tests and I just give up. I’m just like, I’m not going to do this. This time I’m not going to quit….everybody is like, what do you want to get your GED for. And I’m like, because, I’ve always wanted to be a mortician.”
While driving to orientation, Lydia opens up about some of the challenges that have come from her years out of school. Not only does she have to study for the tests, but she’s had to learn how to take the tests. Testing on computer feels completely foreign to her.
“I want to get my GED because I’m getting older. Maybe I can find me a desk job, something to where I wouldn’t be on my feet so much. I just been really hard. I’m just falling apart…but I just need to be positive and keep moving forward because no one is going to do it for me,” she explains.
Only about half of teen mothers I the U.S. earn their high school diploma by the age of 22, according to the YWCA report. Thirty percent of girls who drop out of school point to pregnancy or parenthood as the reason. Like Lydia, Louise Anders dropped out of school at the age of 16 because she became pregnant.
“Honestly whenever I first dropped out of school I thought I was going to be fine. I thought having a kid and not going to School would be fine you can make it,” Louise says. “But these last years I’ve actually struggled. And I want to make a change not only for me but for my son.”
Louise dropped out of school after seventh grade. While she has some support from her family, she struggles with the cost of childcare. That expense alone can average over 9 thousand dollars a year for one infant.
“I literally have to work doubles after doubles after doubles just to make a good check for him. Not having no one to watch him. It’s hard to find a babysitter. It messes up your life. I’d rather just go back, finish, get a better job and start getting out on my own,” she says.
Like Lydia, she wants to go back for her education, and while a G.E.D. may be faster to get, she really wants her diploma. On the morning of our interview with Louise, we sat in on her meeting with Carolyn Thompson, Principal over at Matthews Alternative High School.
Thompson explains, “She’s 18 probably going on 19…and she’s limited. She hardly had any credits. She hasn’t been in school since seventh grade. So the lowest grade we could probably start her at would probably be the ninth grade…so with the GED program they’ll basically work with her and get her prepared to take the GED test…but it still opens that option up for to come and get a diploma.”
But Louise has doubts in her ability to go back to school, “I just have a feeling that, since it’s been so long, I’m too scared to go back to see if I could actually finish,” she says. “I feel like stuff is just going to get way more harder with working, with him. I feel like, I won’t make it.”
Watch Louise and Lydia’s full story on BeyondtheReportLBK.com.
