A Shout Out From Area 12

If you have never been to an Area 12 conference, this video is a testament to the school/group/area spirit that they have. Is your Area louder? Send in proof to the BACCHUS Blog.

Thanks to Area 12 SAC Mark Freeman for submitting this!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mR0HooPakvo

General Assembly 2009

Did you know that registration and preliminary information for General Assembly 2009 is available online now? It's true.

The quick details:
General Assembly 2009 - "Superheroes for Health and Safety"
November 5 - 8
Doubletree Hotel at the Entrance to Universal Orlando

Take advantage of a tremendous selection of learning opportunities during the conference at 70+ educational sessions, 2 keynotes, and 6 featured health issue presentations. If you feel like you need some specialized trainings, you can also take advantage of the pre-conference CPE (Certified Peer Educator) Training or the free Advisor’s College sessions.

There are many great opportunities for professionals, students and guests. At the Assembly, peer educators gain new ideas and strategies for their programming and awareness events. Advisors learn how to make prevention efforts stronger on their campuses while supporting the students who make it happen. Our advisors come from many different areas of the campus but all join together to network and to learn from each other. As a student peer educator, whether your emphasis is alcohol abuse prevention, drug education, sexual responsibility, mental health, nutrition, sexual assault, violence prevention, tobacco prevention, or other health and safety issues, you will find program offerings and other peer education groups similar to yours to gain and share new ideas.

We hope to see you there!

“Social” Smokers

A recently published study analyzed the demographics of intermittent, or “social,” smokers. According to the study, “People with high education and high income, Spanish-speaking Hispanics, and women were the most likely to be intermittent rather than daily smokers.”

It is clear that more can be done to encourage cessation for intermittent smokers.

These smokers may be more "hidden" on campus, as they may primarily use tobacco in social settings off-campus. This is a potential obstacle to creating targeted marketing to this population--simply identifying the population. Are there ways to connect with this group and tailor health promotions and cessation efforts to them? What are campuses currently doing to address the “social smoking” phenomenon?

Bring BACCHUS Expertise to Your Campus

Looking to improve your comprehensive prevention programming and need some ideas on how to do it? BACCHUS can help. The BACCHUS Network™ is offering staff facilitated trainings. Take advantage of these affordable opportunities to bring BACCHUS expertise to your campus. Prices range from $1000 for half-day consultation to $2500 for a day-and-half training and includes travel.

Campus Site Visit & Consultation
BACCHUS will send a senior staff member on a site visit to consult with you, your chief student affairs officer, your students, your campus or community task force, and other key stakeholders to assess program strengths and suggest ways to improve prevention efforts. This structured visit will include a follow up report to assist you with future strategic planning, writing for grants, and budget development.

Screening and Brief Intervention (SBI) Training for Student Life Staff
Screening and Brief Intervention (SBI) has emerged as an effective tool to reduce college alcohol abuse. This training provides a brief screening tool and incorporates motivational interviewing techniques to assist student life staff in having intentional conversations with students. Participants will leave with tools for implementing SBI and resources for assisting students to consider a behavior change.

Certified Peer Educator (CPE) Training
Does the idea of bringing in our national trainer to conduct BACCHUS CPE Training for your campus sound appealing? You can utilize the convenient and affordable option of having The BACCHUS Network™ come to your campus and conduct the training. A BACCHUS staff member will work with you every step of the way to plan the CPE training. The independently evaluated CPE program has increased knowledge, confidence and skills in peer educators completing the training. For less than the cost of many national speakers who present for an hour, you can have a twelve-hour training that empowers your students to commit to healthy and safe lifestyle choices.

Tobacco Cessation Program Training
Tobacco cessation for young adults is a challenging piece of the campus tobacco control puzzle. BACCHUS staff members have expertise in providing cessation efforts on campus. A full-day training includes the top 10 list of campus cessation efforts including: assessment; empathy for addiction; Stages of Change; working with health and counseling centers; medications; cessation groups; technology; targeted promotion; events; staff involvement; and national resources. Participants will leave with strategies for implementing a comprehensive cessation program on campus.

For more information on fees and scheduling, please contact Ann Quinn-Zobeck, Director of Education and Training, at ann@bacchusnetwork.org or 303-871-0901.

Secondhand smoke exposure linked to depression

As we continue to strongly encourage all colleges/universities to pass 100% tobacco-free policies and eliminate secondhand smoke exposure on campus, here is some new research that further justifies passing these policies as soon as possible. The study reports that nonsmokers exposed to secondhand smoke at home or work are more than twice as likely to have major depression than those who are not exposed.

We encourage you to combine this new knowledge about secondhand smoke with other established facts in your tobacco education efforts.

Source: USA Today

- posted by Chris Miller

Reminder - Charter Renewals

As part of your annual affiliation renewal to keep your charter active with The BACCHUS Network, each affiliate must complete and return their 2009 Charter Renewal Form by March 30. For those returning the form on time, your campus will be placed in a drawing for either a CPE Training Kit or a registration fee to the 2009 General Assembly in Orlando, Florida, Nov. 5-8. You can submit the form online, by fax, or postal mail. Mailing was sent to each campus' advisor on record, Feb 20. Check out more information here.

Not a member of BACCHUS? Click here for all the information.

Screening and Brief Intervention (SBI) Toolkit for Colleges

Many campuses will implement brief alcohol screenings for their campus students and staff on April 9, 2009, this year's Alcohol Screening Day. These quick assessments, particularly when followed with a brief, intentional conversation, can help students and staff to identify potentially high-risk alcohol use as well as strategies for decreasing their drinking. Take advantage of a free Screening and Brief Intervention Toolkit for campuses to help your campus effectively address alcohol abuse. BACCHUS will post additional SBI resources in the near future as well.

Identified as an effective strategy for addressing alcohol abuse among college students, The BACCHUS Network™, under a cooperative agreement with the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, created a toolkit to assist college and university campuses utilize screening and brief intervention. Click here to download the pdf of the toolkit and to learn more about this strategy.