Reading, Writing & Rearing : Education: The cycle of early parenthood hits hard. But school programs are trying to help young mothers and fathers cope--and learn.

Almost three years ago, said Coleena Beuer, she got drunk and had sex with her boyfriend without using contraceptives.

“It was just something that happened,” Coleena, now 17, said in a soft voice.

After learning she was pregnant, she was determined to have the baby on her own. Coleena said she never gave thought to getting an abortion or dropping out of high school. Instead, she transferred from Hueneme High School to the Teen Parent Program at Rio Mesa High School in Oxnard. Then she told the baby’s father that she would take care of the child without his support.

Today, after two years in the program, Coleena is a junior and lives on a $535 monthly welfare check. In addition to going to school and taking care of her son, Danny, Coleena cleans up the cramped trailer in which she lives with her grandfather and brother, and cooks meals for the family.

Somehow, she says, she finds time to do her homework at the kitchen table, her little boy’s toys strewn around her. But it isn’t easy. Life can get so overwhelming sometimes that she suffers from stress headaches.

But even in the midst of this turmoil, Coleena has developed a plan.

“I want to become a teacher,” said the Oxnard Latina, taking a break from her homework. “Education is one of the most important things to me.”

To many people, that may seem like an unusual statement coming from a teen-age single mother. But administrators and teachers of two school programs--one at Rio Mesa High School and the other at Oxnard College--say that, in Oxnard, Coleena’s attitude is becoming more commonplace among young parents.

Like several other programs around the county, both Rio Mesa’s and Oxnard College’s programs are designed to keep teen-agers in school by persuading them that education is the only way they will be able to support themselves and their babies. And, like other programs, each addresses issues such as goal-setting and decision-making and offers free child care while the mothers are studying.

But the Rio Mesa High program is the largest in the county, while Oxnard College has a model program that pays students to attend classes while getting work experience. And, in a community that is predominantly Latino, where experts say many young women are locked in a cultural cycle of early motherhood, the Oxnard programs face challenges many others do not.

In 1991, 730 girls under the age of 18 gave birth to children in Ventura County, according to Nikki Steele, coordinator of the public health department’s Pregnant Parenting Adolescent Program for Ventura County. Oxnard, the largest city in the county, led the other cities in the number of minor girls who gave birth, Steele said.

Coleena is one of 185 teen-age parents--most of whom are Latino--enrolled in the Teen Parent Program at Rio Mesa. The program is run by the 6,700-student Oxnard Union High School District. Along with an academic workload, teen-age mothers and four fathers can learn parenting skills, as well as basic life skills such as budgeting and finding jobs.

Although the young mothers’ daily struggles include finding a ride to school, money for medical bills and a quiet place to study, administrators say more of them are choosing to stay in high school than ever before.

Last year, enrollment in the Teen Parent Program rose to 185 from 160 the prior year. School officials say the decline in the district’s dropout rate from 11.7% in 1985-86 to 3.78% in 1990-91 can be attributed in part to the program.

Besides stressing academic achievement, the programs also may give the teen-agers and their children something else. Teacher Jonal Beck said she believes intellectual growth can help these young women break the cycle of teen-age motherhood. By widening their horizons, they can discover they don’t have to take the same avenues their mothers and grandmothers chose.

“It’s going to be hard getting there, but I plan to go to Oxnard College,” Coleena said, adding that she hopes to transfer to a four-year college and then complete a year in teacher training.

Next year, she said, she will tutor Rio Mesa students in an English as a Second Language program.

Many of Coleena’s fellow students still have a way to go before they finish school and formulate a plan like hers. For 16-year-old Mary Gomez, a Latina mother of an 8-month-old baby girl, personal conflicts are making it that much harder to stay in school.

Mary feels torn. Her mother, who also was a teen-age bride, tells her that she shouldn’t have another baby. “My mom tells me (the first one) was a mistake, but I tell her ‘No,’ because I’m happy with (my husband) and the baby,” she said as her daughter, Maria Alexandra, lay sleeping in the nursery in an adjacent classroom at Rio Mesa.

But Mary’s father, 53 and divorced, wants another grandchild. And although her husband, Juan, 21, told her to finish high school because he hasn’t, he won’t let her use birth control.

“I tell him, ‘It’s just to help us right now, I want to finish school,’ and he says, ‘No,’ ” Mary said.

Some of the Rio Mesa students, many of whom come from Catholic families, said they made a choice not to use birth control for religious reasons. For the same reason, they never considered having abortions and gave only a passing thought to adoption. None said she regretted having a child, each saying the baby gave her life meaning, brought happiness and made her feel more mature and responsible.

“It gave me something to live for because my life was all messed up,” Coleena said.

But some teachers and administrators said they believe the reasons some of these teen-agers have opted for parenthood go much deeper.

Lonnie Miramontes, director of community services for the Oxnard-based El Concilio del Condado de Ventura, a Latino advocacy organization, traced the tradition of early parenthood in Latino families to a time when mortality rates were high and large families helped generate a higher income.

Those beliefs have been passed on, he said, though now no one really thinks about why.

“We think we’re supposed to have 10 kids because our grandfather did,” Miramontes said. “That’s the stress that happens when you’re trying to follow obscure traditions that are no longer real in 1992.”

And girls aren’t the only ones who get that message.

Miramontes said Latino boys also are victims of cultural traditions that have hung on through the years. “It’s kind of a little gene that has evolved (that says) we have to prove our manhood, we have to be fertile, we have to have lots of kids.”

Throughout the years, the Catholic church has maintained its position against birth control and abortion, and as a result, he said, many Latino parents do not discuss these issues with their children until after they get pregnant.

“I think it’s a cycle that should be looked at and dealt with,” he said. “I think the church should really look at the realities of life. . . . Otherwise, we’re going to end up with children raising children.”

And when children try to raise children, feelings of confusion aren’t unusual. Some girls say they do not know how they feel, while others seem to have no idea that they can make choices about the future.

“A lot of them feel helpless, that they don’t have enough personal power to call the shots in their own lives,” said Deanna Owens, who teaches a course called College Success at the Oxnard College program.

Like Rio Mesa, the Oxnard College summer program attempts to remove roadblocks that can keep teen-age mothers from attending school. The six-week program, attended by 32 teen-age mothers age 14 to 21, pays the students minimum wage to attend two courses a day--College Success and English--Monday through Thursday.

Students are also paid to work five days a week in offices across campus and receive free parking stickers or bus vouchers. On Fridays, students receive an hour of counseling.

Most of the students in the Oxnard College program are not married. Director Teresa Archuleta, who developed the courses, said her goal was to provide structure for her students. She said she wants them to see the harsh reality of having little money, relying on others for help and trying to raise a baby on their own.

“The idea of living happily ever after is . . .,” Archuleta said, trailing off. “What can I say?”

Although most of the students are Latinas, Archuleta believes the phenomenon has more to do with socioeconomics than ethnicity. Most of the girls come from single-family households run by mothers.

“That’s their role model,” Archuleta said. “That’s the person they want to be like.”

What Archuleta wants for her students is for them to find self-fulfillment in ways other than having babies. But she doesn’t feel it is her place to judge what they have done, only to expose them to another perspective on life.

The $50,000 program is funded through a one-time federal grant administered by the office of the Ventura County superintendent of schools.

Although the grant was only for one year, Archuleta hopes to keep the program going next summer. “I see these girls and they’re so motivated, that I think it would be a shame to let it go and not continue,” she said.

Like the future of this program, the lives of these students hold much uncertainty.

Coleena Beuer knows her goal of getting to college won’t be easy.

“The only thing I regret is getting pregnant so young,” Coleena said. “It’s just put more obstacles in my way.”

But students like Mary Gomez accept their fate with a smile. She said she is happy with her life and encourages others in her situation not to give up.

“If they get pregnant, still go to school,” she advised. “It’s not a wrong thing to get pregnant. It’s not right or wrong.”

If asked, she said she would tell young mothers what her father told her: “You’re not the only one. You’re not the first or the last.”

HELP FOR YOUNG PARENTS

Although the Teen Parent Program in Oxnard serves the most students, there are two other programs in the county for pregnant high school students or students with children.

* At Gateway Community School in Camarillo, young parents attend courses with other students at Gateway, which accepts troubled youths who are in foster care, on probation, have had truancy problems, or have been identified as potential dropouts. Last year, Gateway’s enrollment was 470 students, with 125 enrolled in the pregnancy and parenting program, according to teacher Lynn Coleman.

Gateway, which is run by the Ventura County Superintendent of Schools Office, provides free child care, transportation, free lunches and easy access to the Regional Occupational Program, located next door. That program offers job training in welding, floral design and working as a bank teller.

* Simi Valley offers a small program for young parents at the Simi Valley Adult School and Career Institute.

In the last school year, about 25 students--including one 14-year-old--enrolled in the free minor parent program for teen-age mothers-to-be, or girls and women under 21 who are working on their diplomas, said Jeanette O’Brien, publications coordinator.

The self-paced program provides core academic courses as well as preparatory classes for prenatal care, parenthood, nutrition, infant care and job growth. Child care is provided.