Prevention Programs

Highlights:

• Botvin LifeSkills Training Program is in 16 schools and 5 summer camps in Indian River County
• Since 2012 over 10,000 students have participated and over 4,200 have received the entire 3-year middle school curriculum
• All Indian River County youth with a Civil Citation or Diversions are served at SAC with evidence based interventions

While considerable effort has been expended by many dedicated professionals and concerned citizens, success in the ‘war on drugs’ has been difficult to achieve. Substance use has progressively worsened since 1992. The scientific evidence-based LifeSkills® Training program is one of the only prevention programs to reduce the use of tobacco, alcohol, and other drugs. LifeSkills® Training has positively impacted adolescent’s health knowledge and attitudes, assertiveness, self-mastery and personal control, self-confidence, self-satisfaction, and social anxiety. LifeSkills® has shown to reduce bullying and violence, delinquency, teenage pregnancy and HIV infection. The LifeSkills® program sends trained educational professionals into the classroom to teach middle school students the following units: Self-Image and Self-Improvement, Making Decisions, Smoking, Alcohol, Drugs, Advertising, Violence, Anxiety, Coping with Anger, Communication Skills, Social Skills, Assertiveness and Resolving Conflicts. Unfortunately, many people go through their entire lives without learning these skills or only partially learning them.

Our LifeSkills® Training program has expanded to now include an after-school program for at-risk kids, at the SAC office and at the four middle schools.

The LifeSkills® Training program has been selected as an exemplary, research-based prevention program by: American Medical Association, American Psychological Association, Center for Substance Abuse Prevention, Drug Strategies, Inc., National Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, Office of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention and the White House Office of Drug Policy. It is an all year, three year program for grades 6-8.

Substance Awareness Center’s LifeSkills® Training goals include:

1. Delay the mean age of on-set of first substance use (the earlier the first use, the greater the risk for developing addiction).
2. Increase the practice of healthy coping/social skills of program participants by 50%.
3. Decrease or at minimum maintain the past 30 day trend of substance use by Indian River County LifeSkills® participants. Trends are derived from the Florida Youth Substance Abuse Survey.

We believe that achieving the above goals will decrease LifeSkills® participants risk for substance use and its devastating effects (physically, emotionally and socially), as well as, prepare students cognitively with the essential skills needed in dealing with many stressful life situations.