A new website, located at prosper.psu.edu, will aid in recruiting Pennsylvania communities and families to participate in PROSPER, or PROmoting School-community-university Partnerships to Enhance Resilience, a program proven to reduce use throughout entire communities by working with middle school students and their parents.
PROSPER’s in-school component provides students with a healthy self-image to plan goals, problem solve, and resist substance use and other risky behaviors. The after-school component brings together students and their parents for a family dinner, with a two-hour program following. During the first hour, parents and their children learn in separate classrooms about topics such as communication, discipline and respecting each other’s point of view. In the second hour, parents and children work as a family to complete activities, play games and problem solve.
“When youth prosper, we all do,” said Janet Welsh, PROSPER director and research professor at the Edna Bennett Pierce Prevention Research Center.
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