Program aids students in decision process
Jefferson Township School District’s seventh- and eighthgrade students are participating in Prevention Programming with Montgomery County Educational Service Center (MCESC) Pax Partner Amy Zdenek.
She meets with students each week to work with them using the Evidence-Based Mendez Foundation Drug Prevention and Social Perspectives Programs. Our students are participating with many other students across the county in mitigating risk factors and strengthening protective factors to reduce drug use and violence across the county. The multi-week programs Zdenek teaches are helping students to strengthen skills such as goal setting, decision making, emotion management, effective communication, respect for self and others, peer pressure refusal skills, identifying and avoiding harmful substances and bullying situations, making healthy choices, stress management, anger management, conflict resolution, and self-control.
Lessons and activities build protective factors in students by providing opportunities for pro-social involvement, establishing no-use norms, promoting pro-social peer connections, and increasing personal and interpersonal skills associated with positive behaviors and student success.
The evidence-based program increases the likelihood that students will make positive and healthy choices for themselves and within our community as they become young adults. Montgomery County Alcohol Drug Addiction and Mental Health Services Board (ADAMHS) provides funding for this program and others within our community and others across Montgomery County through Prevention Grants awarded to the MCESC that support the healthy development of our youth through these opportunities in our schools.
Zdenek also works with our Blairwood Elementary School to implement the prevention framework, PAX Good Behavior Game in grades K-6. Prior to becoming a PAX Partner, Zdenek has taught elementary and middle school in Ohio, New Mexico, and Virginia. “Jefferson Township is full of great kids and teachers. I enjoy working with the students in grades K-8,” says Zdenek.