MACRO POST 3
With the red ribbon week coming up in a few weeks our team was energetic and excited to meet with the students of the middle schools. with the videos and the posters being ready to be displayed in the schools we started to work on providing every student with some reminder for this event so we came up with an idea to make red bow pins to distribute to the student to symbolize the red ribbon week which could also be used as a memory of the event and a reminder for them to say no to drugs. Apart from the posters and the pins, we wanted to provide them with some resources that the middle schoolers could use in the future that might help them in time of need. Hence, we came with a plan to make brochures with a few facts about opioid addiction, statistics and data on substance abuse, helpline number for substance abuse and mental health services administration (SAMHSA) to seek help and also, we included signs of overdose and first aid for overdose and counseling and assessment services for them to seek help if need. after the completion of the required need for the event, we contacted the school counselor to sort out a few last details such as the number of students and number of participants for the poster contest and the schedule for the red ribbon week and the event. At both, schools the interactive video and the testimony video was played prior to the event. On the day of the event on the 29th of October, we visited the Benson middle school in the morning followed by McGee’s crossroad middle school in the afternoon. The schools have arranged their posters for the poster competition and they were presented on the walls of each homeroom. We were able to judge these posters and score them according to their use of quotes, illustrations, messages they spread, and their usage of the ultimate theme “the red ribbon week” and “Drug-free me looks like me”. There were several amazing posters made by these children which were difficult to judge and select just a few among them but we decided on selecting one for each grade and among them present the winner and two runners-up. These middle schoolers came up with several innovative and unique quotes to make their posters unique and they were able to represent the theme of the competition with unique animations and other visual representations. On the visitation of the results day, all the students in the school were very eager to hear who won. Then the winning classes were presented with a pizza and ice cream party which were a winner among the students. We were able to speak to the student from some classes and get to know their thoughts on this initiative. A lot of the students were already aware of the information on substance abuse and they were very determined to stay away from it. And some who were not aware of the consequences got to learn and pick up a few good things from this event conducted to educate them. With these kinds of initiatives, we wanted to involve the students to be a part of the learning process and get their hands on creating posters by which they will be more informed on the perils of substance use. We later distribute the brochures one in each homeroom, to sum up, all the things they’ve learned with the details on how to help someone they know with facts and helplines. Team angels with JOCO angels we were able to accomplish some of our goals this semester by creating awareness on addiction to these young minds. We would like to sow in the benefits of staying away from drugs and like to let it grow in their minds. We know that a small step is all that is needed to create a big impact in people’s lives especially with a young kid who is going to be the future of this world. I also believe that these initiatives be continued throughout so that even if there is 50 percent of these students learn something from these events then we might a 50 percent more change to reduce substance abuse among teens.












