October 2, 2014
Our first ideas for this project
were grandiose and focused on creating a substance abuse prevention
presentation for middle school students in Washington and Iron County
School Districts. Mylinda attended the Fall Substance Abuse Conference
and came back with the idea that we were trying to reinvent the wheel.
We have now decided to brainstorm and refocus our energy to the needs of
our community. Southwest Prevention recently gathered data to report
the needs of Washington County. This information will be available after
the 9th of October and our group will analyze the data to see where our
efforts can best be applied. Dave has been trying to get in contact
with Iron County School District with little luck. Robert has a contact
who works for the Drug Enforcement Agency whom he will talk to in order
to learn of the resources we can tap into for our project.
This is exciting! I look forward to finding out what the needs assessment tells you about the needs of the community. And YES, you definitely don't want to reinvent the wheel, so what can you learn from what currently exists in your community? Is what already exists effective? Where are the gaps? As I said in class, getting into schools can be hard, so you might want to focus on a different community. So, after you've viewed the needs assessment results, I recommend that you devise an overarching goal and then talk to people about how best to reach that goal.
ReplyDeleteThis information is timely and relevant as potential legal ramifications come into play. As a voter I appreciate the groundwork effort you have made in collecting and disseminating objective information, especially concerning an often heated topic. One thought I had was whether the dissemination of information concerning marijuana is the most likely method to achieve the desired outcome, or if encouraging parents to create early successes for their children, and to be that connection of a stable and loving adult in the lives of their children may be more effective. This may be outside the realm of your particular project, but it has been on my mind from practice class last semester when we discussed it. Great job on your project...especially in your willingness to change directions after assessing the needs of the community! Dara
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