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Colorado Organization on Adolescent Pregnancy, Parenting, and Prevention (COAPPP)—Building statewide awareness and local capacity to reduce disparities in teen pregnancy, HIV, and STDs

The Challenge

• In 2006, Colorado’s teen birth rate of 44 live births per 1,000 for 15- to 19-year-old females was slightly above the overall U.S. teen birth rate of 42/1,000.¹
• Hispanic/Latina girls in Colorado have a substantially higher teen birth rate than U.S. Hispanic girls aged 15 to 19 years overall: 107/1,000 in Colorado versus 83/1,000 in the nation. More than half of births to 15- to 19-year-olds in Colorado are to Latina mothers.²
• In 2004 alone, preventing teen childbearing in Colorado would have saved tax payers an estimated $167 million.³

Birth Rates (live births) per 1,000 Women Aged 15–19 Years,
by Race and Hispanic Ethnicity: Colorado and United States, 2006

Source:
1. Martin JA, Hamilton BE, Sutton PD, Ventura SJ, Menacker F, Kimeyer S, Mathews TJ. Births: Final data for 2006. National Vital Statistics Reports 2009;57(7).
2. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, National Center for Health Statistics. VitalStats: Birth Data Files. Available at http://www.cdc.gov/nchs/vitalstats.htm.
3. The National Campaign to Prevent Teen and Unplanned Pregnancy. By the Numbers: The Public Costs of Teen Childbearing. Available at: http://www.thenationalcampaign.org/costs/national.aspx*

Proportions of Teen Births Among 15- to 19-Year-Olds
by Race and Hispanic Ethnicity, Colorado, 2006

Source: Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, National Center for Health Statistics. VitalStats: Birth Data Files. Available at http://www.cdc.gov/nchs/vitalstats.htm.

The Solution

• The Colorado Organization on Adolescent Pregnancy, Parenting, and Prevention (COAPPP) provides intensive technical assistance to youth-serving organizations to build capacity to institutionalize and sustain science-based approaches to prevent teen pregnancy. COAPPP’s local partners use a 10-step process to program planning with the Promoting Science-Based Approaches-Getting to Outcomes (PSBA-GTO) program.
• In 2008, COAPPP hosted a statewide conference in partnership with a Colorado school-based health care organization and three national teen pregnancy prevention organizations (Advocates for Youth, Healthy Teen Network, and the National Campaign to Prevent Teen and Unplanned Pregnancy).
  • Nearly 240 clinicians, educators, funders, policy makers, and youth professionals received training and information on science-based approaches to preventing teen pregnancy, HIV/STDs, on PSBA-GTO, and on addressing health disparities in adolescent sexual health.

Youth and Communities Served

• Together, COAPPP’s current local partners serve nearly 11,000 racially and ethnically diverse youth 11–19 years of age from rural and urban communities, many from low-income communities.
• COAPPP builds local capacity to perform community needs assessments, develop logic models, and review curricula to select programs that will best meet the needs of youth in a specific community. For example:
  • With COAPPP’s training and technical assistance, a local partner’s capacity-building attracted funding to substantially expand its program to reach more youth and to hire more staff.
  • During 2007–2008, a local organization serving Latino youth in Denver worked with COAPPP to successfully pilot a teen pregnancy prevention curriculum recently developed specifically for Latino youth. The program is now being offered in other Denver locations as well. More information is available from CDC's National Center for HIV/AIDS, Viral Hepatitis, STD, and TB Prevention.
  • COAPPP is assisting a county health department to strengthen the implementation and evaluation of teen pregnancy prevention efforts within the health department, and to form partnerships with other organizations in the area.

Expected Impact

• Increased knowledge, understanding, and use of science-based approaches and programs among local partners and other organizations throughout Colorado.
• Increased capacity of COAPPP staff to provide technical assistance to local partners in using Getting To Outcomes processes.
• Increased knowledge and support among state and local grant-makers for science-based approaches as a community-driven and effective model to prevent teen pregnancy and STDs.
• Increased awareness across Colorado of disparate Latina teen birth rates.

Targeted Population(s)

• Youth-serving agencies and organizations including community based programs, school-based health centers, residential treatment programs, and health departments.
• Youth facing disparities in teen pregnancy, especially Latino/Latina youth, American Indian Youth, youth in foster care, and youth in rural areas.

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Page last reviewed: 5/17/09
Page last modified: 5/17/09
Content source: Division of Reproductive Health, National Center for Chronic Disease Prevention and Health Promotion