THE ROOTS

By understanding and focusing on mental health in youth we can give them coping skills to use throughout their life. Trauma Informed Care is one training that is offered to help providers understand the impact of trauma on substance use disorders and how being trauma informed has the potential to reduce high risk behaviors.

Family is the foundation for youth. We work to provide community resources to parents to develop and strengthen their parenting skills. Strengthening Families is a program offered through CNCAA. Please contact for more information.

There are certain risk factors that have been identified to increase the likelihood of high-risk behavior. There are also certain protective factors that can reduce the likelihood of high-risk behavior including substance abuse. The Nebraska Risk and Protective Factor Student Survey is what we, as a community team, use to guide our work to help limit risk factors. Protective factors are characteristics associated with lower likelihood of negative outcomes or that reduce a risk factor's impact. 

We work to identify areas in which youth have access to alcohol, tobacco and other drugs, then educate the community on how to limit access. Strategies to limit access include tobacco and alcohol compliance checks. We provide TIPS: responsible beverage server training to help empower serves to confidently refuse sales to minors and intoxicated adults.

By affecting policy in regards to alcohol, tobacco and other drugs, we can affect change over long periods of time. One example is the Clean Indoor Air Act which significantly lowered tobacco use in Nebraska.

The norms developed by families and communities affect how an individual perceives the risks of substance use. We, as a community team, work to challenge social norms that make underage, high-risk, or binge drinking seem "normal". We also challenge social norms surrounding tobacco and other drugs including but not limited to marijuana and misuse of prescription drugs

Education is a starting point for all prevention work. First we must identify that there is a problem and help our community to see and understand the problem before we can work towards a common solution.