History
At its inception, COAPPP was called Educators of School Aged Parents in 1974. After a year of after-work meetings, with increasing membership, the group started meeting for lunches and became a state-wide gathering. In 1984, Educators of School Aged Parents became the Colorado Organization on Adolescent Pregnancy and Parenting (COAPP). COAPP's first statewide conference was held in 1986. The organization then received its 501(c)3 status in 1988.

In 1989, COAPP became a collaborative partner in Governor Romer's Initiative on Teen Pregnancy funded by the newly formed Colorado Trust. Under the initiative, COAPP employed an Executive Director as suggested by the Trust and provided statewide coordination for local coalition development. Additional funds from this partnership were used to fund teen pregnancy/parenting coalitions throughout the state and a teen hot line. At the same time the board expanded to include more community members, lawyers, business leaders.

In 1990 COAPP assumed responsibility for a "Call First" Hotline and added a third "P" for prevention in accordance with the move from NOAPPP (now known as Healthy Teen Network).

According to former board members, the mission of COAPPP shifted in response to the initiative/grant from that of supporting professionals working to prevent teen pregnancy to provide direct services to teens through the hotline.

After 1990, when COAPPP's funding ended it was unable to sustain the help line or fund staff. The help line was taken over by Planned Parenthood. With the leadership of Florence Crittenden, a Denver school supporting teen parents, COAPPP began to regroup and refocus on the original mission. New board members volunteered from teen pregnancy prevention and teen parenting support programs.

COAPPP's most successful conference was in the mid-90s when its keynote speaker was Dr. Jocelyn Elders. It was attended by more than 400 people. COAPPP continued to offer yearly conferences and served as the expert source to the media and other organizations and individuals.

In 2001, COAPPP conducted a survey and held a charette where our constituents determined that we should provide state-wide training and act as a conduit for information to professionals. A web site was developed based on the information gathered from this process, and updated in 2004 to be more informative to our constituents.

In 2003, the Board unanimously decided to "[m]ove forward to create a stronger, vibrant, COAPPP that makes a difference in Colorado for preventing teen pregnancy and assisting pregnant and parenting teens." NOAPPP and Advocates for Youth provided technical assistance to educate board leaders in statewide coalition building and to co-sponsor smaller educational conferences in the metro area and western slope. Efforts in 2004 focused on revisiting the mission, board structure, and statewide pregnancy prevention and teen parenting needs in order to make COAPPP the leader of a statewide coalition to advocate for evidence-based programs shown to decrease adolescent pregnancy and increase successful teen parenting.

In 2005, COAPPP was a recipient of a five-year cooperative agreement with the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Under the CDC's Promoting Science-based Approaches Initiative, COAPPP will work intensively with local teen HIV/STD and pregnancy prevention programs to enhance its planning, implementation, and evaluation of their programs using science based-approaches and increase the statewide awareness of science-based approaches to prevention. In 2006, COAPPP hired a new executive director and received additional funding from the Colorado Health Foundation to develop its strategic plan and enhance its board and fund development.