Prevention Partnership

Prevention Partnership programs

The Community Bridges Prevention Partnership provides community based prevention programs that promote healthy lifestyles to youth, families and communities. Using a multi-targeted approach our programs are designed to teach youth positive life skills, support positive parenting and assist in the development of competent communities that protect their youth. The overarching goal is to reduce the impact of substance use disorders by engaging youth and adults in a strategic process targeting substance use related consequences and developing effective strategies to address the problem.

 Programming targets four domains within a community; Family, School, Individual/ Peer and the Community itself. The strategies for achieving the desired goals and objectives are research based approaches based on the Framework for Prevention in Behavioral Health created by Arizona Department of Health Services, Division of Behavioral Health (ADHS,DBHS). The Prevention Partnership implements the following strategies and programs within communities in Maricopa County:

  •  Life Skills Development both during in and out of school time utilizing the Mendez “Too Good for Drugs” best practice curriculum for grades K-9.
  •  Parent/Family Education utilizing the “Supporting School Success” curriculum for parents of youth kindergarten to third grade and the “Guiding Good Choices” curriculum for parents of youth ages 9-14 years.

  

  • Community Education valley wide to educate parents, professionals and the general public on current drug trends, signs and symptoms of substance abuse, meth use and suicide prevention.

  

  • Public Information and Social Marketing allowing the prevention team to increase public awareness of the risk and protective factors surrounding substance abuse by setting up a mobile classroom in various community venues.
  •  Community Development focused in the 85204 zip code, consisting of youth and adults working together to create change around the issue of inhalant abuse among youth in the community.

 These strategies combined directly address the specific needs of the communities we serve. The services are a combination of individual and environmental strategies. Our efforts are aimed at influencing community norms and reducing the availability of specific substances thereby impacting individual behaviors. Grassroots efforts to address risk and protective factors also include the development of a substance use specific coalition to implement the five step Strategic Prevention Framework to do community assessments, build capacity, plan, implement and continuously evaluate the effectiveness of the prevention programming.