Kristine Napier

About the author: Kristine Napier has been involved in abstinence education in Cleveland, Ohio, since the early 1990s. She is the author of The Power of Abstinence.

Sex-education programs that emphasize contraception have failed to lower the teen pregnancy rate. Programs that emphasize abstinence, however, have slashed teenage sex and pregnancy rates. Raising children to refrain from sexual activity is a realistic goal. While parents are the most important influence on a child's decision to be abstinent, several support groups encourage teenage abstinence as well.

Last year [1996], President Bill Clinton proclaimed May "National Pregnancy Prevention Month." This year, there is a little more substance behind that designation. The National Campaign to Prevent Teen Pregnancy, a nonpartisan, nonprofit initiative supported entirely by private donations, has charged itself with reducing the teen pregnancy rate by one-third by the...