Greenwich Together's Collaborative Multi-Strategy Approach to Reducing Youth Substance Abuse - Greenwich Together operates within the City of Greenwich, Connecticut, which spans 48 square miles and is home to 63,455 people. It is approximately 20 miles from the border of New York City, and part of a region referred to as the Tristate or Greater New York City area that includes areas of New Jersey, New York and CT. The average age in Greenwich is 43 years old, and 24% of the residents are 19 or younger. The current demographic description of Greenwich: 7% Asian, 2% Black, 13% Hispanic/Latino, 73% White, and 4% Other. Twelve percent of the residents speak Spanish at home. The median household income in Greenwich is $180,447 and has a 5% poverty rate. The public school system has 15 schools, servings 8,605 students in Pre-K to 12th grade, Greenwich also has a large number of private schools, 9 in total, serving 5,155 in grades K to 12. Recent use data from the 2023 Greenwich Youth Survey indicate that alcohol and nicotine are the most widely used substances among Greenwich teens. Greenwich Together’s (GT) 2023 survey of Greenwich youth reports easy social access to alcohol and favorable parent attitudes toward youth use. In Greenwich, youth use of nicotine is driven by favorable peer attitudes and social availability. Our logic models and action plan will address these risk factors and local conditions while also building on existing protective factors in our community. Decrease the social availability of alcohol and nicotine across multiple domains focusing on the individual and peer domains. We will address parents' attitudes and behaviors that allow youth access to alcohol in their homes. We will increase the perception of peer disapproval of using nicotine vape devices and alcohol. GT has been using the Strategic Prevention Framework as its prevention approach since 2018 and adopted the Seven Strategies for Community Change also in 2018 to formulate and develop evidence-based and evidence-informed activities. Within the SPF framework, we focus on health disparities in the Greenwich community. GT’s DFC project will continue to target youth in 7th to 12th grade, emphasizing our efforts in 7th and 8th grade to reach youth before entering high school. We will also continue to work with both public and private schools since the private schools make up 37.5% of youth in Greenwich. We have also identified several populations of youth that face health disparities and are at greater risk for lower quality of life outcomes. Our program includes a focus on (i) sexual minorities, (ii) gender minorities, (iii) Hispanic youth, and (iv) youth who report poor mental health. Local and national data supports that sexual and gender minority youth, Hispanic youth, and youth with poor mental health are at a greater risk for substance misuse and disorders compared to their peers.
