University/Schools
Alliance
Executive Board Meeting
October 8, 2008
Arcadia University 3:30 PM
Members Attending:
Linda
Brasel Arcadia University
Liz
Dubravcic Parent, Tatnall School
Erica
Melman Office of Prevention and Early
Intervention
JoAnn
West Salesianum School
Yvonne
Nass Parent Education Consultant
Staff Attending:
Roberta Gealt
Discussions:
·
GRANTS:
The DFC grant year has ended as of September 30th and the new
year has begun.
·
USA
was not awarded a grant applied for from the Drug Free Communities Mentoring Program
to support work with the Building Bridges Coalition in Newark and the new
Middletown Community Coalition. USA will
continue its relationship with these coalitions and try again next year after
some consultation with the funding agency to see how the application could be
improved.
·
USA
also applied for a Sober Truth on Prevention (STOP) of Underage Drinking grant
to support partnering with New Castle County Police and the New Castle County
Community Partnership in implementing the Parents Who Host Lose the Most
program, focused on parallel education and enforcement of Delaware’s laws on
parents who provide alcohol to minors at parties—this application was not
funded either. It is not known whether
this grant opportunity will occur again next year.
·
USA
applied for an American Lung Association of Delaware mini-grant for a maximum
of $10,000 which was fully funded and will start in October 2008 and be
completed by June 2009. It will provide
for an alcohol-focused game format activity for youth, parents or mixed groups,
as well as supportive literature and posters.
·
USA
will also apply for an Alternative Activities and Technology Grant from the
Office of Prevention and Early Intervention.
The application will be to use the mini-grant (amounts up to $5000) to
support Town Hall Meetings on Underage Drinking in the schools in March.
·
The
State Incentive Grant (SIG), which the State of Delaware is applying for
through the Governor’s office, will potentially involve specified community
coalitions to coordinate the prevention efforts in the sub-state planning areas. The proposal will address underage drinking
and marijuana use, as well as lifespan misuse of prescription drugs, so it is
very consistent with USA’s goals and activities. A meeting will be held later in October to
provide further information.
Activities:
·
Presentations
have been scheduled of the Sophia Slides for the After School Alliance, the
Youth Board of the Delaware Community Foundation, and the safety program of the
DuPont Experimental Station.
The slides will be updated with 2008
data.
·
Newark
High School will host a Parent Chat on Transitioning to College on March 4,
2009.
·
Senator
Biden’s office contacted USA, and his office is making connections for us in
Senator Carper’s office and with whomever Senator Biden’s replacement will be
to help ensure continued support. In the
context of this discussion, the Senator’s staff person, Paul Rosen, suggested a
round table discussion of substance use and prevention efforts in Delaware,
bringing in some national figures. While
he originally proposed that this meeting could take place at the end of
October, it has now been decided that USA and the Delaware Drug and Alcohol Tracking
Alliance will co-sponsor a Policy Summit in March to bring together legislators
and other key decision-makers from Delaware, provide information on our current
situation, and develop recommendations for directions to be presented to the
new administration. Jack Claypoole, from
the U.S. Office of National Drug Control Policy (ONDCP), has agreed to attend
to provide a perspective on where the country is headed with regards to
prevention, and he has also recommended USA invite the new Director of the U.S.
Center for Substance Abuse Prevention, Fran Harding.
·
In
addition, Jack Claypoole, who is the ONDCP Administrator for the Drug Free
Communities Support Program, suggested that a team from ONDCP might come to
Delaware to provide a workshop on applying for the Drug Free Communities grants
in May or June to help Delaware increase the number of such grants in the
state. While this will not be in time
for the next round of DFC grants, it will still provide, hopefully, more
specific and strategic help than the CADCA workshops we have sponsored in the
past, which were very worthwhile, but focused on coalition building more than
writing an application for this specific grant.
USA Notes:
·
September
issues were presented. An October issue
is also completed with a focus on smoking.
·
A
discussion on potential audiences to receive the USA Notes included the
following:
o
Middle
and high school principals
o
The
USA contact list
o
Pediatricians
and doctors of adolescent medicine
o
Wellness
Centers
o
Safe
and Drug Free Schools Coordinators (School District level)
o
PTA’s—either
through the state PTA or through schools
o
School
Nurses
o
Legislators
Policy Notes:
·
Recent
research was noted which found that two policies were found to be effective in
reducing youth alcohol consumption. The
first was having the legal drinking age set at 21. The second was to punish offenders using fake
ID’s by taking away their drivers’ licenses.
While Delaware has the first law in place, it does not have the second.
Meeting Places:
We will meet at the UD Cooperative
Extension (Cindy Genau’s office) at 461 Wyoming Rd. Newark DE for the months of
September, November, January, March, May
and July.
We
will meet at Arcadia University (Linda Brasel’s office) at 111 Continental Dr.,
Suite 201, Newark DE for the months of October,
December, February, April and June.
The
next USA meeting will be on November 12TH at Cooperative Extension
at University of Delaware at 3:30 PM.
See
attached directions.