Council on Prevention & Education: Substances

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COPES ( The Council on Prevention and Education: Substances, Inc ) was founded in 1981 as a private, nonprofit 501 ( c ) ( 3 ) organization. The original mission was to provide alcohol and drug education services to students in Louisville public and private school districts. Program efforts were well received by students, educators, and the community at large. Yet, COPES quickly came to recognize the limitations of this initial mission. Classroom instruction was important, but COPES recognized that this should only be part of a larger, community-based prevention strategy if lasting results were desired. COPES expanded its mission and scope of services. By 1983, COPES was working not only with public, private and parochial schools, but also with social service programs, churches, juvenile justice institutions, community recreational centers, and businesses. Funding increased from a sole source contract to multiple contracts and grants. By the mid 1980s, COPES was offering training, workshops, educational programs, and consulting services to urban and rural populations across the state of Kentucky. COPES was developing programs for specific high risk populations, corrections departments, military personnel, teachers, churches, mental health providers, and sports programs. COPES' major focus remained on youth and families and it continued developing programs for both. National recognition first came to COPES in 1989 when it was chosen as one of 16 exemplary prevention programs by The Office for Substance Abuse Prevention, the National Prevention Network, and the National Association of State Alcohol and Drug Abuse Directors. The following year COPES was awarded a five-year federal demonstration grant from the Office of Substance Abuse Prevention for implementing its Creating Lasting Connections program. Ecumenical and community-based in design, this program focused on increasing those community, family, and personal resiliency factors which reduce the likelihood that 12-14 year old youths at risk will abuse alcohol and other drugs, engaged in other delinquent, violent or uncontrolled behaviors. Presented in its entirety, Creating Lasting Connections imparts to parents and youth knowledge and understanding about the use, abuse, and dependency on tobacco, alcohol, and other drugs ; improves communication and conflict resolution skills ; builds refusal skills to resist negative social influences ; and engenders self-knowledge, personal responsibility, and respect for others. The evaluation of this program, under the direction of Dr. Knowlton Johnson, of Community Systems Research Institute, Inc ( an independent party ), used a true experimental design, in that the youth were randomly assigned to either a program or a comparison group. The main published findings included the following. In terms of positive direct effects of the program, there were statistically significant sustained gains by both parents and youth in these areas: In addition to the program effects described above, the evaluation also included examination of "moderating effects" in which the program was shown to have "produced positive moderating effects on AOD use among youth as a result of conditional relationships with changes in family-level and youth-level resiliency factors targeted by the program" ( Johnson et al., 1996: 63 ). For example, a family-level factor that served as a moderator variable for delaying the onset of AOD use was increased program-advocated AOD knowledge and beliefs by parents. The following were statistically significant moderating effects of family and youth resiliency factors on youth AOD use found through the CLC evaluation: Onset of AOD use was delayed among program group youth for one year ( sustained gain ) as parents ( a ) increased AOD knowledge and beliefs ; ( b ) decreased family conflict ( youth report ) ; and ( c ) of punishing youth for AOD use.