Liquor corporation pours money into teen safety program
The Yukon government has offered a three-year funding grant to help address issues of alcohol use and other risky behaviour among the territory's youth.
The Yukon government has offered a three-year funding grant to help address issues of alcohol use and other risky behaviour among the territory's youth.
The program, called Prevent Alcohol and Risk-Related Trauma in Youth (PARTY), will receive $180,000 from the Yukon Liquor Corp. over the next three years to educate Yukon teens about the dangers of risk-taking behaviour.
The program is offered in communities across Canada and the United States.
PARTY focuses on students in Grades 9 and 10, and has been offered in the Yukon since 2002, with an 18-month hiatus due to a lack of funding.
"The three-year funding from the Yukon Liquor Corporation will free up lots of time spent writing grant proposals and frees the co-orindinator's time to continue to make the program a success for Yukon youth,” said Kim Rumley, the program co-ordinator.
PARTY educates participants on the dangers of irresponsible drinking with a hard dose of reality.
The program introduces youth to the front lines of emergency response work, bringing participants to an emergency room or nursing station via ambulance and walking them through the various steps of emergency treatment.
In the end, the students learn what parents have to go through, claiming loved ones from the morgue.
Following the tour, presentations from the RCMP, paramedics and the Department of Community Services' emergency medical services and motor vehicles branches are made, after which youth are asked to sign a "contract for life” certificate: an agreement with someone they trust to give them a ride home, any time, any place.
Despite the raw subject matter, organizers say the program is not meant to simply "scare kids straight”.
"Our theory is hard-hitting, preventative education,” said Rumley.
"We focus on prevention and choices and work with youth to identify the potential dangers of risk-taking behaviour.”
It's an approach that has been embraced by the territorial government.
"I think programs like this, which offer collaboration between departments, can help educate young people from those who are working closest with the issues,” said Scott Kent, the minister for the liquor corporation.
"It's important that we get them through high school safely and into the next phase of their lives, whether that be post-secondary or otherwise.”
A life-long Yukoner and educational support worker, Rumley has also seen the benefits of programs like PARTY first-hand.
"I really believe in kids,” she said.
"But I have seen a lot of youth lost unnecessarily, across Yukon. This program gets kids interacting and engaging and asking questions, and if we can educate one youth and curtail peer pressure, then we have done something wonderful.”
PARTY also receives funding from the RCMP, Yukon Workers Compensation Health and Safety Board and other private and government donors.
Comments (4)
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Trevor Braun on Jan 24, 2012 at 10:12 am
Wow very generous of the Liquor Corp. $60 000 a year for 3 years. I remember reading just a couple years ago of $1 000 000 (thats $1 million)in booze sales in just 3 days. Not sure if was entire Yukon or just Whitehorse store.
Its time to really look at educating our Youth and providing real alternatives and healthy choices.
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Therese Merasty on Jan 24, 2012 at 1:59 am
the program PARTY sound very interesting
for youth and young mothers. how do i apply, i work for band in isolation community. transportation only by air,winter road from feb.-march if weather is cold.
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north of 60 on Jan 19, 2012 at 10:20 am
There is certainly merit in programs like this which gather a group of sober teens together and lecture them on the value of good judgement. Unfortunately most of the serious errors in good judgement are committed by severely impaired teens.
How effective are programs like this in getting teens not to become severely impaired to the point of poor judgement?
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Tom Stevens on Jan 19, 2012 at 1:53 am
I am grateful to see the PARTY program back in the Yukon but curious as to why. The primary funder of the program in the past was Yukon Workers Compensation Health and Safety who crushed the program when they introduced the now imfamous "SMARTRISK" program as the new and better mousetrap. They threw tons on money at SMARTRISK, lost an excellent PARTY coordinator and the program died. Now under the leadership of Ms. RUMLEY its back and effective and needed. Good work YTG abd YWCHS...ps...what happened to the education for the kids that missed the last eighteen months? Brutal