The Fayette County Ohio State University Extension Office and the Fayette County Prevention Coalition will be hosting parent meetings at Miami Trace Local Schools and Washington Court House City Schools for the purpose of providing education on the importance of substance misuse prevention.
Utilizing materials developed by Generation RX, in accompaniment with adult and youth substance free coalition materials, caregivers will be given the knowledge and skills to effectively reduce the chances their kids will fall victim to the substance misuse crisis going on in Ohio.
“We have started a partnership to do a presentation about Generation RX and talk about our coalition, and what our youth coalitions are doing to reduce youth substance abuse in their schools,” Community Action Commission of Fayette County Planner Christina Blair said. “We will be talking about drugs of progression, or what used to be called ‘Gateway Drugs.’ We have gotten away from talking about that because not everyone who starts a substance will continue on to another. Overall, we just want to help parents to be able to talk to their kids and we hope this education will help.”
The first of these events will be held on Thursday at 6 p.m. at the Miami Trace High School Auditorium. In addition to education, the community will also be treated to pizza during the event. The second event will be held on Thursday, Feb. 15 at 6:30 p.m. at Liberty Hall on the Washington High/Middle School campus. This event will also include pizza to enjoy while parents have the opportunity to learn more safe drug practices and other education.
“When you are talking about creating community level change, you can’t just apply one strategy,” Blair said. “We are working on a logic model to reduce youth substance use. We took a look at the community conditions that contribute to youth substance use and we found youth are using because they can access it. They can go buy it. When you look at a logic model you say, ‘Why does this condition exist, what contributes to that condition and what is our plan to help that condition decrease?’”
These events were made possible by support from the OSU College of Pharmacy, Kroger Pharmacy, OSU Extension Office, Scioto Paint Valley, and Fayette County Prevention Coalition’s Drug Free Communities grant number SP080019 from the Office of National Drug Control Policy and Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration.
“But, really, none of these projects would have come to fruition without the guidance of the local ADAMH Board,” said Blair. “The ADAMH Board has provided the coalition with guidance, support and technical assistance throughout the entire process. Furthermore, without their matching funding for evidence-based prevention at our local schools, we couldn’t have applied for these federal funds. I want to express my deep gratitude to each of our sector representatives that have given so generously of their resources and time the past year and a half. Together, we will shift our community’s culture to increase protective factors and decrease risk factors to youth substance misuse.”
For more information about the events, contact Blair at 740-335-7282 or at [email protected]. To review coalition materials and learn about the community needs assessment, visit http://www.cacfayettecounty.org/fcpc/.
The information in this article was provided by Christina Blair planner at the Community Action Commission of Fayette County.
