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It was a month before her high school graduation when she found out she was pregnant.

For Amy White, getting pregnant at 17 was an accident, but for some of her other friends at Adams Central High School in Monroe, Ind., it wasn’t.

“Once one of us got pregnant, everyone started to get pregnant,” White, 21, said. “Everyone loved the attention and the idea of having their own family, and we were all planning on our kids growing up together and being in the same grade.

“So, if they were taking birth control they stopped and started getting pregnant.”

White, along with 12 of her friends who graduated in 2005, became pregnant between their senior year and the time they turned 20. They were part of the first increase of teenage pregnancies in 15 years.

From 2005 to 2006, teenage pregnancies rose for the first time since 1991, according to a National Institutes of Health report. Federal health experts said they didn’t know why the numbers went up or whether the trend is still continuing.

In 2005, the number of births for 15-to-17-year-old girls was about 133,000, or 21 for every 1,000 girls. In 2006, that number rose to almost 139,000, or 22 for every 1,000, according to the report.

In Indiana, there were 10,754 births among girls between 15 to 19, according to a 2006 United States Teenage Pregnancies report.

The Guttmacher Institute ranks Indiana as the 31^st state with the highest teenage pregnancy rate in the U.S., and 49^th for accessibility with providing contraceptives. In Indiana, there were 24.6 pregnancies per 1,000 15-to-17 year olds, in 2005.

White, who is not married and had her second child June 25, said the trend at her school could be attributed to their desire to grow up.

“Probably half of our graduating class didn’t go to college,” White said. “So, everyone who stayed around town was ready to get on with their lives, start having kids and get married.”

But, as she and her friends discovered, having a baby didn’t create their picture perfect family.

White’s high school friend, Jena Mendes, lives in an apartment with her boyfriend. She said she doesn’t have time to hang out with any of her friends because she plans her day according to her baby’s schedule.

“I don’t really talk to anyone from high school,” Mendes said. “Maybe I’ll start again when the kids are in school.”

Although Mendes doesn’t live with her parents, similar to many of her friends she gets financial support from Medicaid.

More than half of all Indiana births are paid for by Medicaid, according to Planned Parenthood. Teenage childbearing cost Indiana taxpayers $3.6 billion between 1991 and 2004.

Dr. Judith Ganser, the medical director of the maternal and children’s health care at the Indiana Department of Health, said the state is trying to disperse the negative effects of teenage pregnancies in a community by implementing a multi-faceted approach to reduce it.

“From the data we have (ending in 2005), Indiana has seen a decrease in teenage pregnancies over the last several years due to many initiatives,” Ganser said. “There have been national programs, more parental involvement, educational programs, religious teachings and the state’s media campaign.”

Indiana is also taking part of a national goal for Health People 2010, in which it wants to reduce the teenage pregnancy rate to 43 per 1,000 adolescents, from a 1996 rate of 68 per 1,000. It also includes goals to increase condom use at first intercourse of 15-to-17-year-olds to 75 percent, and decrease sexual intercourse of teenagers younger than 15 to 12 percent and 25 percent for 15-to-17-year-olds.

Indiana’s goals are in response to the high poverty rates, low birth weights, insufficient health care and higher rates abuse and neglect among children born to teenagers.

White moved back into her parent’s home after her boyfriend broke up with her while she was pregnant with their second baby last spring. She said she was taking birth control pills but stopped because of side effects.

“Only three of my friends are married,” White said. “Most of our boyfriends have cheated on us or left us. One of my friends was in jail for doing drugs when she was pregnant. My one friend got engaged, then joined the Army and while she was gone, her fiancé cheated on her. Everyone has their issues.”

Ganser said Indiana provides national and state funding to communities for sex education. The federal funds are provided for abstinence only education, while the state funds provide for a more comprehensive education.

“Any program should be reflective of the culture of young people they are teaching to,” Ganser said. “They have to be able to use the skills they learn in the culture they live in.”

White’s school provided a sex education class in fifth and sixth grade, where they focused on puberty. In high school, the only sex education course was during the biology class’ genitalia chapter where they learned a small amount about abstinence and birth control.

“I don’t think more sex education or abstinence classes would have done any good,” White said. “It might help some people, but not everyone because they are going to do it whether teachers tell them to or not. We went to school in a small town. There wasn’t really anything else to do.”

Mendes said she wanted to have a baby at a young age because she wanted to be independent, to move out and get married. She said she wants to have another baby soon. She is hoping for a boy.

White said although she and her friends might not have been mature enough to start having children, their kids are still healthy and much loved.

“They are blessings,” White said. “I love my kids more than anything, but I think girls should be more careful when they’re deciding to have kids. It sucks living at home and not having a dad for them. But, we’ll do fine.”