“Each year, U.S. adolescent girls experience up to 850,000 pregnancies and young people under 25 experience approximately 9.1 million sexually transmitted infections (STIs)” (McKeon ). Clearly this shows us that teenagers are sexually active, yet school systems refuse to effectively educate our youth on what being sexually active fully entails. Sex education can be approached in two different ways; complete and abstinence only. Comprehensive sex education “covers both abstinence and age-appropriate, medically accurate information about contraception. Comprehensive sexuality education is also developmentally appropriate, introducing information about relationships, decision making, assertiveness, and developing skills to resist social and peer pressure, depending on grade level” (Advocates ). Abstinence only sex education programs rigorously teach abstaining from any sexual activity until marriage. The main difference between the two approaches is that comprehensive sex education teaches abstinence as a secondary option, and adolescents who choose not to wait until marriage to engage in sexual activity are adequately informed about how to use different birth control methods. This issue directly affects sexually uneducated adolescents and impacts adolescents who choose to engage in sexual activity, not only in the present moment but perhaps for the rest of their lives. When teenagers become pregnant, their future plans immediately change; they are less likely to complete school and more likely to become single parents. This in turn directly affects all children born to them, "have less supportive and stimulating home environments, poorer health, poorer cognitive development, poorer academic achievement, more behavioral problems and are more likely to become teenage parents... half of the sheet ......abstinence and condom use: are we sure we are really teaching what is safe?” Health Education and Behavior 26: 43-54. Kirby, Douglas. “Emerging Responses: Research Findings on Programs to Reduce Teen Pregnancy.” www.files.eric.ed.gov. Web. 2 December 2013. McKeon, Brigid. “Effective Sex Education.” Youth Advocates, 2006. Web. 3 December 2013. “Mission and Values.” NewMorning Foundation "Who we are." PPFA. Web. 2 December 2013. SIECUS . “What is SIECUS?” www.siecus.org. nd Web. 2 December 2013. The National Campaign. “Counting: The Public Costs of Teen Pregnancy in South Carolina 2008.”. 2013.