Acupuncture and wearing beer goggles, not so regular activities for school leavers, it may seem? But a closer look reviles a very serious message!
Did you know that at least one third of anti social behaviour is alcohol related? and that young people are more likely to divulge in risk taking behaviours when drinking alcohol or taking drugs? In response to this, last month Stockton’s Community Safety Team and young person’s drug and alcohol service named STASH gave the key facts and important messages around drug and alcohol misuse to young people across the Borough.
As part of the National Citizenship Service ran by Safe in TeesValley many young people partook in a two hour session that involved a mix of hard need to know facts and with light hearted fun games that held a serious message. The aim of the session was not only to inform the young people around drug and alcohol misuse but to take the young people on a journey. Starting out with prevention and the work they may experience through lessons in school, to enforcement, with an asb officer telling the process of what would happen if someone was caught with drugs or alcohol and the final stop landing with the treatment process. STASH explained the 'ins' and 'outs' of what would happen if a young person needed treatment for an alcohol or drug problem, a chosen few young people even got the chance to finish the session off with a try at acupuncture! Most importantly the self referral scheme was highlighted to the young people explaining that if anyone thinks they may have a problem with drugs and alcohol they can self refer themselves for treatment and help, one person in the session decided to take the step and self refer, and is currently working with STASH to deal with their addiction – a great step forward for one young person!
Heather Hutchings from Stockton Councils Community safety team deemed the day a success and noted: “Whilst we know that young people like to experiment and its good that we got the important and true facts across today, we also know that actually most young people in Stockton don’t drink alcohol when socialising with friends and 95% of our year eleven pupils have not used drugs, but however its important to inform our young people in order to help them stay safe and untimely to not become a victim or put themselves in a vulnerable situation”
For more information about drugs or alcohol visit www.stash-online.org.uk or other ‘risky behaviour’ go to www.knowtherisks.co.uk