Eagle River Valley Strategic Prevention Efforts - The Eagle River Youth Coalition (ERYC) collaborates with all youth-serving entities in the Eagle River Valley to assess, identify and address the most pressing needs of youth in our community, identified as youth substance use and mental health. Youth needs are addressed through coalition efforts, community-based processes, information dissemination, education and environmental efforts to prevent you access and use of alcohol, marijuana and tobacco. The project name is the Eagle River Valley Strategic Prevention Efforts and will focus on implementing the strategic prevention framework including assessment, capacity building, strategic planning, implementation, evaluation, and collaboration to serve youth and families to address underage alcohol, marijuana and tobacco use. The focus population for this proposal includes youth ages 9-25, parents/caregivers, community members, and youth-serving entities in the boundaries of the Eagle County School District in Eagle County, Colorado. All efforts are intended to reach the broad community and focus on addressing youth access and use of substance. The coalition will conduct a needs assessment and develop a logic model that will be used to create implementation, strategic, and evaluation plans that will guide comprehensive prevention efforts. The goals and measurable objectives of this project include increasing community capacity and infrastructure to prevent youth substance use, promote risk factors, decrease contributing risk factors, and decrease youth substance use by implementing evidence-based programs, policies and practices that address behaviors that may lead to initiation of use. The following strategies will be conducted as part of a comprehensive prevention plan. The coalition will coordinate information dissemination and capacity building trainings to increase community knowledge of and ability to respond to priority youth needs, attendees will feel more knowledgeable about the topic and confident in facilitating prevention work. ERYC will lead strategic planning processes that result in the development of a youth prevention strategic plan with partner approval of key strategies, training for youth-serving professionals to feel more confident in navigating referral systems and responding to youth and family needs, and a partner family engagement framework where families are aware of services through a centralized communication strategy. The efforts will increase youth engagement and leadership opportunities with participants believing their voice results in positive community change. ERYC will increase networking and coalition engagement by recruiting new coalition members annually to support youth substance use prevention efforts. In-school prevention education will reach youth with age appropriate evidence-based programs, increasing participant perceptions of risk of harm related to substance use. Family prevention and secondary prevention education will serve youth and families with evidence-based programs, with participants reporting improved family communication. Positive social norms campaigns will result in surveyed youth recalling the prevention messages. Youth alternative activities will be held with attendees recognizing that the activities helped them stay away from situations that encourage use of substances. Policy education will occur with local municipalities being educated in at least one environmental change strategy that reduces youth access and use of substances. Annually, the coalition anticipates serving 1,500 youth and 600 community members through strategies, serving 10,500 individuals over the course of the project. Through a comprehensive and inclusive approach, the coalition aims to prevent youth alcohol, marijuana, and tobacco access and use.
