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Show Families in Focus program fighting drug abuse I. - ft - " t i I 1 Can we actually prevent drug and alcohol abuse in our families? The Families In Focus program says you can. This program recognizes recog-nizes that strengthening relationships relation-ships within the family plays a big part in the prevention of drug and alcohol abuse. Families In Focus was developed de-veloped by The Cottage Program in collaboration with Utah State University's Uni-versity's Cooperative Extension Service. This exciting new program, prog-ram, supported by a federal Action grant, is designed to work with high-risk families whose preschool pre-school and school age children are at risk for substance abuse because of their generational history, as well as their environmental circumstances. cir-cumstances. One of the unique aspects of this program is that volunteer sponsored spon-sored families are trained to work directly with high risk families. Bernell N. Boswell, executive director of The Cottage Program, has appointed Debra Hampton as volunteer director for the Families In Focus program. As director of Volunteer services, she will be coordinating 50 volunteers in Weber, We-ber, Salt Lake, and Davis counties to work with ISO families who are at-risk to alcohol and drug dependency. depen-dency. Volunteers will be thoroughly thor-oughly trained in small group leadership, personal interaction and family dynamics as they apply to alcohol and drug abuse prevention. preven-tion. One volunteer will be assigned to three high-risk families and meet with each family for two hours each month for 12 months. What volunteers learn in training and in working with families will also be helpful in relationships with their own families. Volunteers don't need experience in these areas, but they will need a lot of personal commitment and care. The program is humanized by its family-to-family design a design which is responsive to the needs of each family. Each family has very different needs. The individual needs of the family are determined and a program prog-ram that they can benefit from is developed to meet those needs. By having a program specifically de-" de-" signed to help each family, a family will be more responsive and therefore, there-fore, more apt to integrate the skills into their own lives. A recent Harris Report found some telling results. "More than 9 in every 10 interviewed nationally ranked alcohol and drugs ahead of other youth programs, such as teenage pregnancy, unemployment, unemploy-ment, crime and teenage suicide." "Liquor and beer were seen as the principal substances abused by youth followed by marijuana, tobacco, wine and wine coolers, cocaine and crack, valium and other prescription drugs and heroin." he-roin." "Of those surveyed, 75 percent felt the family should take the dominant role in dealing with the problem, but only 17 percent felt k. the family was doing an excellent or good job." A family that can interact on a healthy level has a much better chance to prevent drug and alcohol abuse. Can we actually prevent drug and alcohol abuse? Yes! you can as a knowledgeable, healthy heal-thy family. If you are interested in learning more about Families In Focus or volunteering with this program to help strengthen families, a meeting with an enjoyable light lunch is planned on Wednesday, Sept. 30 from 1-2 p.m., to introduce the Families In Focus program. There will be an explanation ot the program prog-ram and chance to get acquainted with each other. There are also many other areas in which help is needed such as office work, mailings, mail-ings, school presentations, etc., to support this program. For more information and to reserve re-serve a place at the luncheon, please call 532-6185 or 1-800-752-6100. ni DEBRA HAMPTON |
