by AngelaCharles

Created on: May 19, 2009   Last Updated: May 27, 2009

Drug Abuse Prevention for Your Community

According to a 2008 Monitoring the Future Survey, over 48% of 12thgrade students reported that they had some form of elicit drug use in their lifetime (MTF). With statistics such as this it is easy to see why more and more communities are struggling to build a successful drug abuse prevention program. To create a successful drug abuse prevention program in your community you need to start by building a strong foundation for the children of your community. This foundation comes in three distinct layers: family, school and community.

Family

According to the National Institute on Drug Abuse (NIDA) the most crucial risk factors for drug abuse begin at home. Family risk factors include parents who abuse drugs or suffer from mental illness; lack of strong parent-child attachments in a nurturing environment; poor parental monitoring; and ineffective parenting.(NIDA) These risk factors are often intensified for families living in poverty, causing a ripple effect within a community of generation drug abuse and poverty.

Regardless on the size of your community, you can offer successful drug abuse prevention programs that will help parents build a stronger foundation for their children and break the cycle of generation drug abuse and poverty. Important things to consider when evaluating the resources that your community may need to develop a successful drug abuse prevention program are the number of single parent households in your community, the different ethnicities within your community and the percentage of impoverished families. This will give you a sense of what populations you may need to customize your drug abuse prevention programs to. Then you will need to evaluate the resources that your community may already be offering, and how you can enhance or expand these programs to reach those who need it most. A few programs to consider would include quality daycare assistance programs, drug and alcohol rehabilitation programs and parenting educational classes. While you may not consider all of these programs drug abuse prevention, when implemented properly they can stop the ripple effect, and ultimately decrease the number of drug abusers in your community.

To successfully offer drug abuse prevention programs, youth need a solid family foundation to build upon. By offering programs that assist parents from all demographics in improving that foundation, you are more likely to improve the quality of life for your

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