{"id":17391,"date":"2024-05-18T16:12:31","date_gmt":"2024-05-18T15:12:31","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/drugprevent.org.uk\/ppp\/?p=17391"},"modified":"2024-09-22T17:48:27","modified_gmt":"2024-09-22T16:48:27","slug":"other-states-drive-youth-prevention-in-ways-oregon-does-not","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/drugprevent.org.uk\/ppp\/2024\/05\/other-states-drive-youth-prevention-in-ways-oregon-does-not\/","title":{"rendered":"Other states drive youth prevention in ways Oregon does not"},"content":{"rendered":"
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States like Washington and Pennsylvania work with scientists to help schools put in place science-backed prevention programs<\/span><\/h1>\n<\/div>\n
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by<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n
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EMILY GREEN<\/a><\/div>\n

|<\/span>THE LUND REPORT<\/span><\/div>\n

JANUARY 16, 2024<\/div>\n
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This article is part of an investigative series<\/a>\u00a0showing that as Oregon kids face a world with increasingly dangerous drugs and unparalleled external pressures, the state\u2019s education establishment has failed to adapt.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

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They\u2019re participating in what\u2019s known as \u201ccooperative learning.\u201d It\u2019s a teaching method in which students spend time working together in randomly selected groups. As they teach each other, it promotes interaction among kids who otherwise wouldn\u2019t socialize, combating peer rejection. . In a trial across 15 middle schools, cooperative learning lowered rates of alcohol use and other risk factors that contribute to substance use, such as emotional problems, bullying, deviant peer affiliation and more.<\/p>\n

Following that Oregon-based study, cooperative learning\u00a0was recently listed<\/a>\u00a0among approaches to reducing substance use problems that experts say have good scientific evidence to back them.<\/p>\n

Oregon\u2019s position is \u201cironic,\u201d said Anthony Biglan, a senior scientist at Oregon Research Institute who studies youth prevention. Oregon is \u201cone of the strongest states\u201d in terms of research on school-based prevention, he said, but isn\u2019t putting what it knows into practice. Cooperative learning, for example, is used by some individual teachers, but has yet to be adopted across any district.<\/p>\n

Other states do more when it comes to connecting classroom substance use prevention with science.<\/p>\n

A\u00a0recent investigation found<\/a>\u00a0that in Oregon, most school districts teach substance use prevention curricula and programs that have not been found to meet even the minimum standard of efficacy set by some of the nation\u2019s top prevention and curricula clearinghouses. That\u2019s despite a state law requiring districts to have an up-to-date, comprehensive, science-backed program. And the state does\u00a0little to help<\/a>\u00a0them.<\/p>\n

Biglan and other prevention experts point to Washington, Colorado and Pennsylvania, where the state governments have formed partnerships with prevention scientists at local universities to roll out evidence-backed prevention strategies across the state.<\/p>\n

Now, a new set of recommendations from Oregon\u2019s Alcohol and Drug Policy Commission is urging state lawmakers to launch a similar effort as they head into the 2024 legislative short session next month.<\/p>\n

Other states put science at the center of prevention<\/h3>\n

In Washington and Pennsylvania, state officials work with prevention scientists at local universities to ensure state programs support evidence-based prevention strategies at the community level. In both states, schools and communities can get state grants to pay for prevention if they select from a predetermined list of evidence-backed programs to adopt.<\/p>\n

In Pennsylvania, much of the state\u2019s prevention work flows through the Pennsylvania Commission on Crime and Delinquency, which works closely with the\u00a0Evidence-based Prevention and Intervention Support<\/a>\u00a0center, or EPIS, at Pennsylvania State University. There, principal investigator Janet Welsh\u00a0and her colleagues have helped implement evidence-based programs in communities and schools that studies indicate led to reductions in\u00a0delinquency<\/a>\u00a0rates and\u00a0fatal opioid overdoses<\/a>.<\/p>\n

The state has also championed several programs aimed at reducing youth substance use, Welsh said. That includes funding community coalitions, and rolling out a well-regarded\u00a0national<\/a>\u00a0community-based model called PROSPER, which was developed at Pennsylvania State University. It brings together prevention coordinators and universities to deliver two evidence-backed interventions in schools: LifeSkills Training and Strengthening Families. It\u2019s had\u00a0positive results<\/a>.<\/p>\n

In Pennsylvania, when communities or schools use state grants to implement programs, they are required to apply evidence-supported approaches as they were designed and track their outcomes, Welsh told The Lund Report.<\/p>\n

\u201cThere are people off in silos doing their own things in Pennsylvania, just like there are anywhere else,\u201d Welsh said. \u201cBut we try really hard to have these coordinated systems to the degree that we can.\u201d<\/p>\n

In Washington, the health authority\u2019s behavioral health division\u00a0oversees and coordinates prevention efforts<\/a>\u00a0in the state, working with a committee of\u00a0researchers, policymakers and community-based advocates<\/a>\u00a0to incorporate science in a statewide approach. Every three months, the group convenes to discuss pressing issues, potential approaches and the latest research, said the subcommittee\u2019s chair, Brittany Cooper. Cooper is a principal investigator at Washington State University\u2019s\u00a0Improving Prevention through Action (IMPACT) research lab.<\/p>\n

Cooper and her colleagues at the lab regularly look at evidence to review prevention programs and strategies before recommending them to the state. The state also looks to the Washington Institute for Public Policy for guidance on the\u00a0cost-benefit<\/a>\u00a0of different research-backed programs. Strong programs are added to the state\u2019s\u00a0list of approved prevention strategies<\/a>\u00a0that communities pick from when doing state-funded prevention work.<\/p>\n

Both states\u2019 approaches place a major focus on community coalitions that bring together schools, law enforcement, public health officials and local groups.<\/p>\n

Washington has more than 100 such coalitions, and Pennsylvania has trained more than 125 on the model, known as \u201cCommunities that Care.\u201d In Oregon, health authority officials were\u00a0not able to<\/a>\u00a0supply The Lund Report with a complete list of community coalitions.<\/p>\n

In both Washington and Pennsylvania, the departments of education are an integral part of prevention coordination,\u00a0unlike in Oregon<\/a>.<\/p>\n

State could spread promising approaches<\/h3>\n

On the December morning that The Lund Report visited the South Eugene High School classroom, Zach Lazar\u2019s students were learning about Oregon\u2019s geological history. They were separated into small groups, with each group learning about a different phase of the state\u2019s formation. The kids had to work together to make a group presentation in Google Slides. Next, Lazar walked around the room handing out playing cards, and the sophomores regrouped according to the suit of the card they were handed. Now each student had to teach their new group what they had learned.<\/p>\n

For Lazar, it\u2019s a way to ensure kids are paying attention. \u201cIt allows everybody to be active and present in the space \u2014 and that\u2019s huge,\u201d he said. \u201cYou can\u2019t hide when you\u2019re going to be expected to teach someone else in a few minutes. You\u2019ve got to get your stuff done.\u201d<\/p>\n

Cooperative learning also encourages students to interact with students they might not normally talk to. The idea is this breaks down biases and prejudices among students that serve as barriers to social connection, and helps socially isolated students establish positive relationships with their peers.<\/p>\n

Mark Van Ryzin, a research professor at the University of Oregon, led a study of cooperative learning involving 1,890 middle school students in Oregon that documented the program\u2019s positive benefits. The study found cooperative learning-involved students experienced lower rates of alcohol use, emotional problems, deviant peer affiliation and bullying, as well as higher rates of prosocial behavior, emotional empathy and close relationships with peers. The clearinghouse Blueprints for Health Youth Development, which rigorously evaluates the research behind prevention programs, certified Van Ryzin\u2019s study for its scientific strength and\u00a0listed cooperative learning<\/a>\u00a0on its registry of recommended \u201cpromising\u201d interventions.<\/p>\n

Van Ryzin said the types of benefits achieved through cooperative learning are key in substance use prevention. \u201cThe best approach is to attack the social-contextual issues that lead to experimentation with drugs, but very few programs do this successfully,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

After class, a couple of Lazar\u2019s students told The Lund Report that they had indeed made friends with people they may not have otherwise talked to when learning this way in science class. They also said that Lazar was the only teacher they\u2019d ever had who uses this style of teaching.<\/p>\n

Creating groups and moving kids around can take extra time that teachers don\u2019t have. But Van Ryzin thinks an app he\u2019s developed could be used more widely to help more teachers around the state. It creates random student groupings as it moves a class through a pre-loaded curriculum.<\/p>\n

He said one opportunity he sees is with high schools\u2019 recent effort to adopt curricula to help ninth graders build skills to succeed in high school.<\/p>\n

\u201cSchools have told me, they just pull things off the internet, nobody has any idea if any of this works,\u201d Van Ryzin said.<\/p>\n

In contrast, software loaded with this curriculum and backed by a central state program could embed these lessons in classrooms while also spreading the benefits of cooperative learning.<\/p>\n

\u00a0\u201cWe could potentially kill two birds with one stone,\u201d he said. \u201cSo we\u2019re building peer relations, building social skills, building belonging, keeping students on track, keeping them in school \u2014 why couldn\u2019t we solve all these problems at once?\u201d<\/p>\n

Where Oregon stands<\/h3>\n

The state\u2019s Alcohol and Drug Policy Commission, which is charged with\u00a0improving Oregon\u2019s state and local addiction treatment, prevention and recovery systems, sent its\u00a0legislative recommendations<\/a>\u00a0to Gov. Tina Kotek and state Senate and House majority and minority leaders on Dec. 11. At the top of its list was a request to fund \u201ca statewide hub for Substance Use Prevention.\u201d<\/p>\n

Biglan, who has studied youth prevention for more than three decades, sits on the commission\u2019s prevention subcommittee. He said he hopes there is a \u201csignificant representation of prevention scientists\u201d if the hub is approved. He said state agencies including the education department should also be involved, along with Oregon\u2019s regional coordinated care organizations that oversee care delivered to low-income members of the Oregon Health Plan.<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019m concerned that there\u2019s not enough involvement of the Department of Education,\u201d he said, adding that the department seems to lack the authority and programmatic support \u201cto influence the schools to do things.\u201d<\/p>\n

At the University of Oregon\u2019s Prevention Science Institute, research scientist Emily Tanner-Smith said prevention scientists would \u201cbe excited\u201d to partner with the state. \u201cUO researchers have deep expertise in school- and community-based prevention programming and thus would be well-poised to engage in such activities,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n

In Oregon, \u201cwe don\u2019t have comprehensive prevention\u201d anywhere, said Annaliese Dolph, a former aide to Gov. Tina Kotek who took over as director of the state Alcohol and Drug Policy Commission last year. Connecting research and practices will be a \u201ckey role\u201d for the commission she said, adding that if lawmakers set up the recommended statewide hub, prevention scientists would \u201cabsolutely\u201d play an integral role.<\/p>\n

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This article was created as part of the series, \u201cUnsupported: Addiction prevention in Oregon classrooms<\/a>\u201d a reporting project by The Lund Report, University of Oregon\u2019s Catalyst Journalism Project and Oregon Public Broadcasting, with support from the Fund for Investigative Journalism.<\/h6>\n<\/div>\n

Source: https:\/\/www.thelundreport.org\/content\/other-states-drive-youth-prevention-ways-oregon-does-not<\/p>\n

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States like Washington and Pennsylvania work with scientists to help schools put in place science-backed prevention programs by EMILY GREEN |THE LUND REPORT JANUARY 16, 2024 This article is part of an investigative series\u00a0showing that as Oregon kids face a world with increasingly dangerous drugs and unparalleled external pressures, the state\u2019s education establishment has failed […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[10,40,19],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-17391","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-education-sector","category-prevention-research","category-usa"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/drugprevent.org.uk\/ppp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17391","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/drugprevent.org.uk\/ppp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/drugprevent.org.uk\/ppp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/drugprevent.org.uk\/ppp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/drugprevent.org.uk\/ppp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=17391"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/drugprevent.org.uk\/ppp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17391\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/drugprevent.org.uk\/ppp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=17391"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/drugprevent.org.uk\/ppp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=17391"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/drugprevent.org.uk\/ppp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=17391"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}