Randy Chestnut
Helping young people prevent future addiction
A lot of young people get pulled into drug culture because they don’t have hope, they don’t have goals — and so that culture can seem appealing for some as a way to get money and a sense of acceptance.
Young people really need to have a positive network around them — advocates, champions, guides — and the more that happens, the whole drug culture will seem less attractive.
Our organization works with Dayton schools, Mad River schools, Northridge schools, a church in Miamisburg and an elementary school in Northmont, and we partner with the Dayton Regional Manufacturing Association, Learn to Earn Dayton and the Think Tank in Springfield. We work with kids in fourth grade through high school, and our goal is to match 180 kids with a mentor, focusing on character development and career pathways. We help our mentors understand the cost of poverty and to be trauma-informed, because a lot of our kids are coming out of homes where there has been a death by overdose or some type of addiction problem.
We’re more on the prevention end of the spectrum — we don’t tell kids, don’t do this because it’s bad for you; we want them to decide on their own they don’t want to do drugs because they’ll miss out on all the good things they could have. We want these kids to grow up and see Dayton as the kind of community where they want to stay, because there are lots of opportunities for them here.