Attendance is a challenge with this group. The availability of transportation is a barrier for some, work and school schedules is a barrier for others. A consistent staff member who can have time dedicated to the consistent outreach and communication measures necessary is lacking. Adding the planning and coordination of this program onto the workloads of those with already high workloads is proving to be ineffective, thus as you will note in our action plan, a proposal has been made to support this program with funding that can provide staff hours.

Public Health home visitors work to encourage attendance to the class at each home visit.

Past staff who have facilitated this program have had success with outreach and reminders to the adolescents through the use of text messaging, however, current staff do not have text messaging capabilities and are reluctant to use personal cell phones for this purpose.

It is proposed in the funding request for the 2014-15 school year that dedicated staff time with pay be planned for successful coordination and outreach effort to this adolescent parent group.