NYC campaign against teenage-pregnancy

Hey guys,

today's post is about the following task out teacher gave us: We are asked to write a letter to the NYC Human Resources Administration, telling what we think about their campaign and how they could improve it.
We were given some posters and we could decide whether we want to talk about all of them or only about one. I chose this one:

Dear NYC Human Resources Administration,

recently I saw a poster of your campaign against teenage-pregnancy.

On the one hand, I think it's important starting campaigns like this and making aware of how negative teenage-pregnancies can affect the teenager's lives. Teenager's are still kind of children and need their childhood. A pregnancy can take all of this away. It makes the teenagers take responsibility which is mostly too much for them because they can't really care for themselves. How should they be able to care for a child?
On the other hand, I'm not sure whether these posters will affect what they should.

The poster I recently saw is the one with the little girl on it. Her expression is sad and she seems to be worried. Next to her is the sentence "Honestly Mom...chances are he won't stay with you. What happens to me?".

In my opinion it's clever putting the picture of a little girl on the poster. The campaign is there for making teenager's think twice about getting pregnant. The girl on the poster shows what it's all about - it's exactly what teenagers should avoid.

The text next to the picture is very suitable aswell. Teenagers are young, which means they can't be in a relationship for many years. I would describe teenage-relationships as something the teenagers want to experience and want to have fun, but generelly they don't last many years.
For me it's strange thinking about finding a partner while being 16 or 17 years old and being sure to spend the whole life together. That's the problem with teenage-pregnancies because once the child is born, the parents don't know what to do. Staying together just for the good of their child? Or seperating and letting the child grow up with only one parent?
Because of that I think that the question "What happens to me?" is so right. I can imagine that most teenagers don't think about this question when they're being intimate or when the girl's pregnant. I'm sure this poster makes some teenagers think about it!

In my opinion there are three different groups you could put teenagers in.
One group are the caring teenagers. They are aware of what could happen and they think about important things twice. Then there's another group that maybe could be reached by such a campaign because it definitly shows what the future could look like and I'm sure they don't imagine their future being like this. Like on the poster: Having a child, seperating from the partner and not knowing how to carry on with the child.
The third group of teenagers is why I'm not sure that these posters will affect what they should. These teenagers do whatever they want to - no matter whether they read such a poster or not. It won't make them think about anything. It's just a made-up sentence and why should the future be like this? It can also be another way.

I also thought about whether there's a way to improve the campaign. I'm not sure whether there's anything that makes every teenager be aware of what a teenage-pregnancy does with their lives, but maybe more teenager's could be reached by showing them facts. Showing them facts and statistics how it could affect THEIR lives. Your campaign seems to show what happens with the child or how the child's life will be, but it could be that showing facts about their life maybe reaches them more. It could also be that showing them pictures of teenage parents with their babies while they have to renounce to go to a party or to do something with friends, would make them be aware of the consequences. They wouldn't be able to do those things because they've got a child. I think something like that could scare them off.

It's good that there are campaign's which try to "save" the teenager's lives, if you see it in a way that a pregnancy can "destroy" it. I'm convinced that there are teenager's out there who will be more carefully after seeing this campaign. I think especially some teenage girls will think about it because very often you can hear a teenage girl say: "Oh, how cute is this baby?" and I'm sure nobody wants to give birth to a child who could have disadvantages because its mother gave birth to it in a very young age.

Best regards,

Maike