Prevention – Page 2

Building a Bridge to a Healthier Community

Join the ACT Missouri Youth Ambassadors as they share with you the building blocks to building a healthier, smoke free community. Receive a sample template to present to the city council, advertising ideas, and engagement strategies to ensure that your community thrives.

Main Presenters: Gunner Smith, Joe Viebrock, and Camren Worthley, Youth Ambassadors

The Youth Ambassador Program is designed to empower the youth of today to be the substance abuse prevention leaders of tomorrow. Through interactive exercises, comprehensive trainings, and targeted focus on community needs, the Youth Ambassadors develop materials and support regional centers and school programs to prevent substance abuse.

High School Students Teaching Bully Prevention with Younger Students

Members of the high school Bully Prevention Team will share the methods and effectiveness of teaching and demonstrating bully prevention strategies with younger kids ages 8 to 13. The presentation will describe how a selected team of older students is trained and prepared to provide effective, interactive classroom presentations and skits with younger students. Components of the classroom presentation will be provided and discussed.

Main Presenters: Jamie Myers, Prevention Consultants of Missouri
Hannah Pritchett, Kobe Wands, Chloe Myers, Rolla High School

Hannah, Chloe and Kobe are seniors at Rolla High School and have been presenters with the Bully Prevention Team for two years. They are all active in sports and other organizations at school and in the community. Jamie Myers is the director of Prevention Consultants of Missouri. He developed the Bully Prevention Team and has been working in the prevention field for over 25 years.

Finding Your Family

Everyone longs for a home. We are born with a need for family, for security, and for a place in this world. My workshop will help you understand how to heal and help family relationships that are hurting. We will tackle how addiction breaks down all the members of the family, and we will work together on building each other up and forming healthy, happy relationships with your family. Addiction is a family disease, but hope is there. Addiction might tear down, but recovery can make family relationships even stronger than before! I am proof of that. This workshop will help you find your family again.

Main Presenter: Dana Bowman

Dana Bowman is an English teacher at both the college and high school level. She is also a writer and speaker on the topic of parenting and alcoholism, with publication in The Fix, After Party Magazine, Today’s Christian Woman, and many more. Her book, Bottled: A Mom’s Guide to Early Recovery, narrates her story from addiction to recovery with humor and honesty. Dana speaks often at youth and family events about addiction and recovery, and it is her life’s mission to help others find hope and healing from this disease.

The Project Purple Initiative

The Project Purple is a group of students who pledge to stand up to substance use and enable themselves to make good choices in their lives and to work towards being who they want to be by providing alternative activities to do. The National Site provides activities, contests, videos, and all types of support for the group. It is a simple concept. Another draw to the initiative is the structure of the group, the kids do all the work, including coming up with creative ideas on what to do in the school.

The Project Purple is a National Initiative started in 2011 by Chris Herren and the Herren Project. The mission of Project Purple is to empower youth to stand up and make a difference. Going Purple gives students motivation and support as they embrace a message of education and awareness. Students learn that they do not need drugs and alcohol to meet life’s challenges; that they are perfect the way they are.

Michelle Irwin, MSAPA, First Call

Michelle Irwin, MSAPA, Outreach Specialist for First Call Alcohol /Drug Prevention & Recovery. I have been with First Call since 2008, providing Presentations, trainings, high school and community youth groups, marketing and special event services through out the community. I believe I have the best job in the organization because I get to work with young people and community members, educating on the substance use and the consequences along with prevention services and activities. I also get to promote all the wonderful work accomplished at First Call. When I am not working, I spend my time with my daughter and pursuing my love of equestrian sports.

What If…? Discover Possible

What If is a 45-90 minute presentation designed to inspire middle school and high school students to look beyond their current situations and to ask questions about the potential their lives may hold.The presentation equips students with a tool to help them make good decisions. What If prompts students to begin to think about their lives from new perspectives through the use of engaging questions, creative thinking exercises and interaction among students and educators.

What If is about the present and the future. It is not about the past in any way. It is not about things beyond our control. There are no questions about “what if I was born a different person?” or “what if my parents were rich?”. We have been shaped by events of the past, and what has happened in the past cannot be changed, but the future is full of possibilities.

Main Presenter: Brad Lademann, Missouri AfterSchool Network

Brad Lademann is a dynamic speaker with 16 years of public speaking experience and 12 years of experience working with middle school and high school students. He has worked with teens in many capacities including teacher, youth pastor, coach, and mentor. Brad worked with Communities In Schools (CIS) as the supervisor of an after school program for “at-risk” middle school students as well as CIS site coordinator for a Title 1 middle school. He currently serves as the Resource Center Coordinator for the Missouri AfterSchool Network. Brad lives in Columbia with his wife, three kids, and one extra large dog.

Advocacy-Prevention That Works!

Advocacy can seem like such an overwhelming word. Our goal is to break it down into smaller pieces and give you ideas of what you can do to advocate. Come join us as we share proven prevention methods that can lead to positive changes in your community. We received the Community Health in Action Award and Coalition of the Year Award in 2015 for our Nicotine is Nicotine Campaign. We were also recognized for our involvement in raising the age of tobacco and nicotine product purchase/sales from 18 to 21 in Kansas City, Missouri in 2015 and Gladstone in 2016. We will discuss how education, social marketing campaigns, and advocating to key community members (including elected officials) can result in powerful prevention.

Main Presenters: Jordan Elder and Conor Henry, Youth With Vision

Jordan Elder and Conor Henry are the co-chairs of Youth With Vision. Youth With Vision is a student led organization made up of middle and high school students from Clay, Platte and Ray counties. Members strive to decrease substance use among their peers by putting education into action. These young leaders have gained local, statewide, and national recognition for their programs, and would love to share the knowledge gained from their efforts and campaigns with other youth groups across the state!

Marijuana: What’s the Big Deal?

This interactive workshop will allow participants to discuss the opinions that are most commonly shared among young people who have a low perception of risk regarding marijuana. The roundtable discussions will be followed by five targeted facts about the impact of this drug on the brain, mental health issues, use by teens, medicinal efficacy, and public health.

Main Presenter: Julie Hook, NCADA-STL

Julie Hook is a Prevention Specialist with the Eastern Regional Support Center at NCADA. She works with community coalitions in Warren, Franklin and St. Charles Counties to help implement Substance Abuse Prevention initiatives in those communities. Julie and her husband Fred live in Washington, Missouri, and have two daughters, Emily and Abigail. Their family also includes two dogs, two cats, and seven fish.

Beating Heroin Takes a Community

Heroin and prescription opiates are a difficult problem to tackle. As a result, individuals can feel overwhelmed. This presentation is designed to education students on how they can advocate both the legislature and organizations at home to take solid steps in combating the opiate epidemic.

Main Presenter: Brandon Costerison, NCADA-STL

An Alabama native, Brandon Costerison moved to Missouri in 2007 to work in electoral politics. In October 2015, Brandon took his same passion for helping those in need to NCADA, where he currently works as a Public Awareness Specialist, running the Curiosity and Heroin campaign.

Getting to Know Your Legislator

Getting to know you…getting to know all about you. These Julie Andrews lyrics are familiar to some of us classic folks, but who knew they applied to something like advocacy? Last week, about 30 Missourians had the privilege of attending the annual CADCA Forum, and, more importantly, had the opportunity to get to know some of our federal legislators. As exhilarating as this experience was, one does not have to go to this extreme to start the advocacy process.

So, where do you begin? Do you know who your representative and senator are, but not much else? You are not alone! The best place and time to start getting to know him or her is here, and now. With a little research, patience, and diligence, you will soon know more about your legislator than just their political affiliation!

If you do not know who your legislators are, you will need to determine your 9-digit zip code by typing in your home address. Once you have this, you are ready to navigate to the House of Representatives website. Type in your zip code where it says “Who Is Your Representative?” and it will take you directly to his or her page. Now you can determine: how long they have been in office, what bills they sponsor or have sponsored in the past, and what they may be willing to sponsor. You can also read their bio to ascertain what their personal interests are, what civic organizations they belong to, what their professional background is, and if they are from a rural or urban community. Use this same process with your Senator and click where it says “Legislator Lookup”.

Now, to get a little more acclimated with their policy interests, investigate which committees they serve on. For example, a farmer may serve on the Agriculture committee, a teacher on the Elementary and Secondary Education committee. Make a special note of which Appropriations committee they serve on to further determine basic interests. If you want to see how your legislator voted on past bills, email ACT Missouri at info@actmissouri.org and we will research it for you.

For information on lobbyists that are financially contributing to your legislator, check the reports on the Missouri Ethics Commission website.

Remember, legislators rely on their constituents for input, stories, data, and most importantly, votes! Email your legislator, set up an appointment if you desire, or just offer to be a resource on your area of expertise. You will be singing “Getting to Know You…” in no time!

2016 Youth Ambassadors Attend First Training

Ambassadors represent the following schools:

Calvary Lutheran High School (Jefferson City)
Kennett High School
Linn High School
Morgan County R-I (Stover)
Morgan County R-II (Versailles)

The Youth Ambassadors meet once a month to discuss current problems in their areas and help achieve their mission to end substance abuse in their communities and Missouri. Regular trainings and activities are scheduled with the discussions to enhance participation and understanding of subject matter.

The Youth Ambassadors met for their first training on January 7, 2016. This dedicated group of six completed six exercises:

Cause & Effect: Ambassadors matched causes of substance abuse to related effects
Elevator Speeches: Ambassadors learned how to best spend their thirty seconds in an elevator to explain to someone what they do as an Ambassador
Personal Mission Statements: each Ambassador learned that reviewing goals regularly is important in accomplishing them
Bridge to Support: using everyday items, Ambassadors built a ‘bridge to support’ before learning how a combination of treatment techniques is most successful

Cause & Effect, Revisited: Ambassadors determined the best treatment option for varying types of substance abuse
Guess Who: Ambassadors reviewed real stories of substance abuse and pinpointed where prevention programs could have intervened

Taking ACTion to Build a Healthy Missouri