For the past twenty-five years, the Northeast Community Challenge (NECC) Coalition in Ohio has worked to prevent risk behaviors among youth. The coalition works within all sectors of four municipalities in Ohio: Blue Ash, Montgomery, Symmes Township, and Sycamore Township, to support a community-wide approach to prevention. NECC presents a comprehensive approach to working to build the Developmental Assets, utilizing them as protective factors in a prevention model to strengthen substance abuse prevention and increase protective factors for related risk behaviors.
The Coalition consists of representatives from twelve community sectors: schools, parents, law enforcement, social services, government, businesses, youth, media, senior citizens, service organizations, health organizations, and faith organizations. The Coalition works collaboratively to send a consistent message about clear boundaries and expectations for healthy behaviors, attitudes, and norms. This is accomplished through media literacy, community-wide public awareness campaigns/forums, environmental strategies, sector education, and sector-driven initiatives.
With many sectors initially unsure about how to integrate the asset framework into their work, the coalition used a risk and protective factor model and Search Institute’s Developmental Assets research to identify strategies for all twelve identified community sectors. Focusing on Boundaries and Expectations as the core asset category which all community sectors could support, the coalition looked at every sector to find specific and meaningful ways each could support young people. Each sector was examined, the risk factors and protective factors were identified, and the NECC Coalition came up with strategies specific to each sector.
For example, the protective factors the NECC Coalition associated with the Law Enforcement sector are Asset 3: Other Adult Relationships, Asset 10: Safety, Asset 31: Restraint, Asset 32: Planning and Decision Making, and Asset 35: Resistance Skills. Considering these protective factors with the central theme of Boundaries and Expectations, some of the strategies that emerged include party patrols, compliance checks, and assistance in the coordination of server-seller trainings.
Protective factors associated with the School Sector are Asset 12: School Boundaries, Asset 14: Adult Role Models, Asset 5: Caring School Climate, Asset 32: Planning and Decision Making, and Asset 35: Resistance Skills. Area schools have been trained by Search Institute in integrating the asset framework into their school communities. The schools work to identify ways to integrate the asset framework within their respective schools, promote community-wide campaigns to educate students, faculty and parents regarding the legal, health, and social consequences of underage drinking and other illegal substances, enforce policies related to substance abuse and related risk behaviors, provide parent forums, and increase skills and strategies related to child and adolescent mental health issues.
Parent involvement has been an important part of the NECC Coalition’s work. The parent sector of the Coalition works to promote the Coalition’s community-wide campaigns to prevent and reduce underage drinking and related risk behaviors. The protective factors parents can provide have been identified as Asset 1: Family Support, Asset 2: Positive Family Communication, Asset 11: Family Boundaries, Asset 31: Restraint, Asset 32: Planning and Decision Making, and Asset 36: Peaceful Conflict Resolution. One of the key strategies named to make the information more widely known and used was parent-to-parent education which addressed topics such as talking to their children about risk/protective behaviors and monitoring their children’s behavior online. This also serves as a forum for parent networking, with the goal of increasing protective factors and skills for children and adolescents.
The NECC Coalition also has a Youth Coalition, a group of young leaders from area high schools that provide peer-to-peer education. The Youth Coalition uses the asset framework when conducting annual leadership trainings and in developing and implementing prevention projects in their schools and communities. One recent project is a social marketing campaign (Is it Worth the Risk?) to prevent underage drinking that focuses on consequences to young people’s developing brains and futures.
The asset framework is integrated into all of the NECC Coalition’s strategies and campaigns. Through the support of the Drug Free Communities Grant, the coalition provides training, resources, and support to build the capacity of the Coalition (all 12 community sectors) to promote the development of healthy communities and healthy youth. Every October, a community-wide Red Ribbon Campaign is launched to mobilize and give visibility to the work being done to reduce and prevent underage drinking, drug use, and other risk-behaviors. In October of 2008, Search Institute’s President Peter Benson was the keynote speaker and the NECC Youth Coalition also presented. The Youth Coalition used the asset framework to provide each sector of the community with ideas about how they can increase protective factors for youth.
To download NECC Coalition Brochures and other materials, visit the initiative page.
For more information, visit the NECC website www.necchealthycommunity.org or contact Dr. Loretta Novince at necc@cinci.rr.com.
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