Effects of an urban high school-based child care center on self-selected adolescent parents and their children.

This study examined the effects of an urban high school-based child care center on parenting teens and their children enrolled during 1995-1998. Retrospective record review of 52 low-income, urban adolescent parents enrolled at the Celotto Child Care Center (CCCC) during the period of study was conducted from the CCCC and the high school records. Mean age of the student parents was 17 years (s.d. = 1.3) and mean grade level was 11.2 (s.d. = 1). Most parents were female (98%) and African American (62%). Children enrolled at CCCC had a mean age of 10 months (s.d. = 10.8). Students using the services of CCCC showed improvement in overall grade point averages, and 100% were educationally successful as defined by promotion to the next grade or graduating from high school. None of the students experienced a repeat childbirth during the period of CCCC enrollment. Ninety percent of children were up-to-date with pediatric health visits and immunizations. These results lend strong support to the importance of extending child care and social support services to teen parents, and for the implementation of high school-based child care centers as alternative sites for these critically important services.