From West Texas to the suburbs of Houston a number of schools are moving toward “abstinence-plus” education at the urging of health advisory committees made up of community members. The approach emphasizes that waiting to have sex is best, but it also teaches students about condoms and birth control. To get a sense for which parts of the state have the most teen pregnancies, check out our map, which shows the birth rate for girls ages 13 to 17 in 2009.

How is birth rate calculated? Here, the teen birth rate represents the number of births in the county by girls ages 13 to 17, divided by number of girls in that age group who live there. The result is multiplied by 1,000 to represent the number of births per 1,000 girls. It is important to note that the birth rate may be misleading for counties with small populations due to the nature of the calculation, particularly for counties with fewer than 100 girls who meet the age criteria.

Click on a county to see that county's rate, number of births and estimated female population age 13 to 17 in 2009. Or, use the table below the map to view, sort and compare counties.