Teen Pregnancy Prevention Education in California: Adapting Curricula to Fit the Local Context

For several decades, the California Office of Family Planning (OFP) has funded local agencies throughout the state to provide education and outreach to prevent adolescent pregnancy and improve adolescent sexual health. Teen Pregnancy Prevention (TPP) grantees are required to provide medically accurate, age-appropriate, culturally inclusive sexuality education, while adhering to the state Education Code, which stipulates specific topics and skills to be included. To better understand how grantees implemented curricula, evaluators at the University of California, San Francisco (UCSF) conducted in-depth telephone interviews with 129 program coordinators in 2008. Qualitative data were analyzed for content, themes, and representative quotations; quantifiable responses were tallied across interviews. TPP grantees provided education in a variety of settings, including public schools (80%), alternative and continuation schools (71%), recreation centers (48%), and juvenile justice facilities (34%). While 60% of agencies implemented recognized national curricula, such as Reducing the Risk (18%), Safer Choices (11%), and Streetwise to Sexwise (10%), many agencies used self-developed curricula (25%), or a combination of multiple curricula (14%). Program staff often modified curricula to ensure that the material was appropriate, relevant, and accurate. Common adaptations to existing curricula included: tailoring material by participant age, maturity, and risk factors; modifying teaching styles and activities to better fit participants' needs; and updating lessons to reflect current scientific data. Results describing the most common modifications to sex education curricula reflected grantees' challenges in meeting state requirements and maintaining fidelity to a curriculum, while providing up-to-date, accessible, pertinent, and quality sexual health information to youth.