What We Do
We help create healthy and safe environments in which to raise young people. Our school-based prevention programs reach youth directly and community-based initiatives empower parents and families to wrap their kids in protection.
Impact Communities' youth development programs focus on reducing risk factors that contribute to poor academic performance and unhealthy behaviors and increase protective factors that promote achievement and belief in one’s worth and value. Risk factors are qualities of children and their environments that place them at greater risk of later behavioral problems; protective factors are qualities that promote successful coping and adaptation and thereby reduce those risks.
In addition to school-based programs, Impact Communities coalitions are focused on reducing youth access to alcohol, marijuana and prescription drugs by working with parents to increase their knowledge on how to safeguard their children. We use various data-driven, community-level strategies such as establishing safe drug disposal locations, hosting Prescription Drug Take-Back Days, town hall events, parent education nights, and media campaigns.
Studies have shown that evidence-based prevention programs do more than decrease drug use; they also reduce mental health problems and crime and promote academic motivation and achievement. Thus, these programs can have tremendous, long-term benefits for the children and families we serve, as well as for society as a whole.
