About a year after Beverly Donofrio's memoir, Riding in Cars with Boys, was published, she received a call from Joanne Savio from the Educational Program for Pregnant and Parenting Adolescents -- EPPPA for short. Donofrio's memoir was about growing up as a teen mother on welfare and putting herself through college. Savio had read it and implored Donofrio to visit the unique high school. "We got nothing but pregnant and parenting girls here," she said. "They're real pissers. I've read to them from your book. They're going love you. You're a success story. You got to say yes."

EPPPA was a very different school than the one Donofrio had attended. At EPPPA, a student could walk into the school pregnant, take all the academic classes required for graduation plus a coarse in parenting, have pre- and postnatal exams, deliver her baby, and return to classes two weeks later (six if she's had a cesarean). In 1992, Donofrio visited the school and met with the students, bringing her tape recorder along.

Reporter: Beverly Donofrio / Producer: Dave Isay / Engineer: Caryl Wheeler.

Please consider supporting the work of Sound Portraits and StoryCorps by making a donation.

This piece is available in the following audio formats [12:41 min]:
		28.8 kbps Real Audio
		56 kbps Real Audio
		ISDN Real Audio

		intro

		Riding in Cars with Boys, Donofrio's memoir about being a teen mom
		The movie adaptation of Riding in Cars with Boys
		"Big-Hair Contest," a radio short by Donofrio about Long Island girls with big hair
		"Thursday Night at the Bingo," a radio short in which Donofrio plays bingo with her mom
		Looking for Mary, a documentary by Donofrio about the Virgin Mary
		National Campaign to Prevent Teen Pregnancy

home  |  ON-AIR |  in-print |  about |  education |  support |  store

Sound Portraits Productions, 80 Hanson Place, 2nd Floor, Brooklyn, NY 11217
Telephone (646) 723-7020 | Fax (646) 723-7026

Copyright © 2008 Sound Portraits Productions. All rights reserved.