ED’s OSHS PREVENTION NEWS DIGEST Office of Safe and Healthy Students MAY 2, 2013 VOLUME 8, NUMBER 17 | |
In This Issue 1. Let’s Move! Active Schools is the Theme for National Physical Education and Sport Week (May 1-7) 2. The USDA Farm to School Census: Has Your District Been Counted? 3. Synthetic Marijuana Third Most Reported Substance Used by U.S. High School Students 4. Webinar To Explore Educating System-Involved Youth 5. SAMHSA urges communities to commemorate National Children’s Mental Health Awareness Day, May 9, 2013 6. Study: Smoking Prevention Programs in Schools Can Reduce Number of Future Smokers The opinions expressed herein may not reflect the views of the Office of Safe and Healthy Students or the U.S. Department of Education. The availability of information from a variety of sources does not constitute and should not be considered as an endorsement of those sources by the U.S. Department of Education. We hope that you find this information to be useful. If you think ED’s OSHS PREVENTION NEWS DIGEST would be helpful to a friend or colleague, please send them to this website to: self enroll, change information, or unsubscribe. Contact Us: If you have any questions or suggestions, please contact me at: Sharon Burton Editor | Let’s Move! Active Schools is the Theme for National Physical Education and Sport Week (May 1-7) “Let’s Move! Active Schools, the theme for National Physical Education and Sport Week (May 1-7), is a comprehensive program that empowers school champions to create active environments that enable all students to get moving and reach their full potential. Quality physical education is the center of a comprehensive school physical activity program. The American Alliance for Health, Physical Education, Recreation and Dance (AAHPERD) invites all educators to visit the specially created May Week website. Here it is: http://www.aahperd.org/naspe/advocacy/events/mayWeek/index.cfm There you will find a template logo and press release, daily activities, a proclamation, great resources and much more. A big part of being healthy for children is getting the recommended level of physical activity – 60 minutes a day! Check out these two wonderful Public Service Announcements from the President’s Council on Fitness, Sports and Nutrition. One features Co-Chair Drew Brees of the New Orleans Saints and the other features Co-Chair Dominique Dawes, 3-Time Olympic Gymnast. Please post these PSAs on your websites and share with parents, administrators and your school communities the importance of physical activity for all! In addition, share AAHPERD’s new infographic about 60 minutes of daily physical activity from our Shape of the Nation Report. http://www.aahperd.org/naspe/publications/shape-of-the-nation-infographic.cfm Thank you for supporting physically active students! For more information about Let’s Move! Active Schools, visit www.letsmoveschools.org Source: AAHPERD The USDA Farm to School Census: Has Your District Been Counted? Across the country, school districts are responding to questions and checking boxes that will produce the most in-depth records available about farm to school activity in the United States. At USDA, we are very excited! This first of its kind nationwide survey of more than 13,000 districts – the USDA Farm to School Census – is focused on determining how many schools currently purchase local foods, but it will also collect information about activities such as school gardening, farm field trips, and integration of farm to school concepts into the regular classroom curriculum. Information from the Census will be used by USDA to set priorities for outreach and technical support, and Census data will also be made available to the public in the form of a web-based map and various state-level estimates of farm to school prevalence and activities. So, do you know if your district has been counted? In mid-March, state agencies responsible for administering the federal child nutrition programs sent a link to complete the Census survey to the school food authorities in their states. This week, we’re making a final push to get as many responses as possible before the survey officially closes on Friday, May 3. Regardless of whether districts source local foods or participate in any farm to school activities, we want to hear from them. If your district hasn’t yet completed the survey, now is the time! Click here to learn more about taking the Census survey and check out this blog post, written by our National Director Deborah Kane, about doing the farm to school math. Farm to School - Learn more at http://www.fns.usda.gov./cnd/f2s/ or contact us at [log in to unmask]. Source: U.S. Department of Agriculture Synthetic Marijuana Third Most Reported Substance Used by U.S. High School Students More high school students report using synthetic marijuana than any other substance besides alcohol and marijuana, according to data from a recently released survey of 9th to 12th graders. Alcohol and marijuana were the most prevalent drug used, with 57% reporting alcohol use and 39% reporting marijuana use in the past year in 2012. The third most prevalent substance used was synthetic marijuana (12%), often referred to as K2 or Spice. Use of all other substances was reported by 10% or less of high school students.. Synthetic marijuana products typically consist of plant material treated with synthetic cannabinoids, psychoactive substances designed to bind to and stimulate the same receptors in the brain as THC. Synthetic marijuana use in general has been linked with adverse effects such as increased heart rate and blood pressure, anxiety, agitation, and acute kidney injury. However, there are more than 140 different types1 of synthetic cannabinoids, each with potentially different potency as well as adverse effects2. The exact synthetic cannabinoids contained in synthetic marijuana products is impossible to determine without specific testing—studies have shown that the types and amounts of synthetic cannabinoids can vary greatly between products, lots, and even within the same package3. In reality, youth who report using synthetic marijuana likely have no idea what specific synthetic cannabinoid they are using or what the effects will be. Adapted from The Partnership for a Drug-Free America and the MetLife Foundation, The Partnership Attitude Tracking Study (PATS): Teens and Parents, 2013. Available online at http://www.drugfree.org/newsroom/research-publication/full-report-and-key-findings-the-2012-partnership-attitude-tracking-study-sponsored-by-metlife-foundation Source: Center for Substance Abuse Research Webinar To Explore Educating System-Involved Youth On May 16, 2013, from 2 to 4 p.m. ET, the U.S. Department of Justice, Office of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention’s National Training and Technical Assistance Center will present the Webinar “Reversing the School-to-Prison Pipeline: From Incarceration to Education.” Presenters will discuss strategies for engaging system-involved youth in culturally relevant education programs, developing high-quality program components, and exploring the benefits of higher education in juvenile justice settings. During a 30-minute Q&A session that will follow the presentations, editors from the Harvard Educational Review will take questions on issues affecting incarcerated youth whose lives have been impacted by the school-to-prison pipeline. Register for this free Webinar, the second in a series on removing barriers for youth in the juvenile justice system. View, listen to, and access materials from the first Webinar in the series, which focuses on the consequences for youth of keeping and distributing juvenile records. Source: U.S. Department of Justice SAMHSA urges communities to commemorate National Children’s Mental Health Awareness Day, May 9, 2013 National Children's Mental Health Awareness Day is a key strategy of the Caring for Every Child's Mental Health Campaign, a public awareness effort where communities can promote a comprehensive system of care approach to children's mental health services. The campaign supports the strategic use of social marketing and communications strategies to raise awareness about the importance of children's mental health and share information about trauma and resilience in children. SAMHSA offers supporting materials to help communities host their own observance of National Children’s Mental Health Day. Source: U.S. Department of Health and Human Services Study: Smoking Prevention Programs in Schools Can Reduce Number of Future Smokers Smoking prevention programs delivered in schools can be effective in reducing the number of future smokers, a review of studies suggests. These programs appear to be successful in preventing young people who have never smoked from starting for at least one year, according to Science Daily. Researchers from the University of Oxford in England analyzed 49 studies that included a total of more than 140,000 young people ages 5 to 18 who had never smoked. The studies found that after one year, the number of smokers was significantly less in groups that participated in smoking prevention programs. “This review is important because there are no other comprehensive reviews of world literature on school-based smoking prevention programs,” study co-author Julie McLellan said in a news release. “The main strength of the review is that it includes a large number of trials and participants.” Programs that taught young people to develop social skills, with or without training to resist social pressure to smoke, had a significant effect on preventing smoking in those who had never tried it. Programs that only taught skills to resist social pressure were not effective. The review found booster sessions to reinforce the lessons of the programs were not helpful, unless they focused on social skills and peer pressure resistance training, the researchers report in The Cochrane Library. Source: Partnerships for Drug-Free.org |