Imagine a high school where teenage girls would stop into the health clinic for a pregnancy test, come back with positive results, and high-five each other like they had just scored the winning basket in a game.

Not just two girls, or three — but 17 girls in Gloucester High School, Massachusetts, are believed to have made a pact to become pregnant and raise their babies together.

What?! Now, I may have graduated from high school eight years ago, and it was in a tiny Midwestern town, but there is absolutely no way becoming pregnant — let along intentionally — was considered “cool,” or in these case, almost trendy.

In the Gloucester school, all 17 girls were under age 16, and most of them were sophomores. On average, the high school, which has about 1,200 students, sees four pregnancies per year.

According to an Associated Press article:

“If you’re a young person who really is struggling to find an identity for herself, absent the support and the guidance, it can become almost a default option for some to become a mom,” said Patricia Quinn, executive director of the Massachusetts Alliance on Teen Pregnancy. “We need to do more for young people and show them more paths.”

Christen Callahan, a former Gloucester High student who had a child when she was 15, said on NBC’s “Today” show that some of the girls would ask her about her own pregnancy. “They would say stuff like, ‘Oh, I think my parents would be fine with it and they would help me,’ stuff like that,” Callahan said.

Whoa. I think at 16, our main concerns at my school were grades, sports and social life. Perhaps we were a little bit sheltered, but I would like to think we share this same sentiment with most students our age.

This is not to say the parents should not try to support their daughters when this does happen; however, this behavior does set a precedent for that community, and even for girls nationwide who may be going through hard times and want a distraction from their problems. Some would say your teen years can be some of the most difficult you will experience.

In a 2006 report from the Minnesota Organization on Adolescent Pregnancy, Prevention and Parenting, there were 72 births reported for girls ages 15-19 in Mower County, a birth rate of 55.6 (number of teen females in that age group per 1,000). In comparison, Freeborn had a 39.3 percent rate; Olmsted had 25.8 percent; and Dodge County had 26.4 percent.

The Mower County Department of Human Services has reported that this area does have high pregnancy and birth rates, and provides services like the Open Door for confidential counseling and support.

It is easy to point the finger at what causes teen pregnancy: lack of sex education (or too much sex education); not enough accessibility to contraceptives (or too much accessibility); peer pressure; troubled home lives; teen celebrity pregnancies; or absent parents. Who or what to blame is not an easy one for people to come to an agreement on.

But one thing is for sure — by choosing to become moms, these teens are taking on what is probably the biggest job they will ever have — the responsibility of raising another life. They aren’t cute and cuddly babies for long, and before the know it, those infants will be teenagers, just like themselves.