New Wellness Club Comes to Newtown High School

The Students Against Destructive Decisions (SADD) club at Newtown High School has recently transformed into the Student Wellness Awareness Team. Besides the name change, the club has altered their goals and has come up with new strategies for sending out information to high school students.

Four NHS students and three adult advisors make up the core team, but they are hoping to get many more students involved in the club. The four co-chairs are Cate Haggerty, Danielle Scarpa, Jimmy Craig, and Josephina Mendez. The advisors working with the students are NHS teacher Carol Skolas, district health coordinator Judy Blanchard, and Kim Killoy, a chairman of Newtown’s Prevention Council. The group’s mission statement says, “The Student Wellness Awareness Team was established in 2014 to support NHS students and provide information for healthy living.”

SWAT is a branch off of the town-wide prevention council. Newtown’s Prevention Council focuses on providing citizens of all ages with information on how to make smart and healthy choices. It also gives information on proper prevention, intervention, and prevention techniques for drug or alcohol abuse. This new team is zeroing in on the NHS community and hopes to positively influence teenagers and teach them about how to live healthier lives.

“This group is focused on prevention of many different diseases. We want to cover a variety of topics, not only drugs and alcohol,” Skolas said.

The club’s main goal is to bring awareness to NHS students about different health problems with which they may be faced. The students plan on encompassing unique topics and utilizing informative articles and tips. Much of the information that students who actively participate in the group will receive is knowledge that they would not get in a required health class.

“We are putting out ways to prevent certain health problems that are apparent in high school students’ lives,” Craig said.

There will be a different theme for each month, in which articles about that topic will be posted on their Twitter and Facebook pages. Follow them on Twitter @StudentSwat, or join their Facebook group titled “Student Wellness Awareness Team (SWAT)” for links to interesting articles on a variety of health related topics.

“We are starting as a new group with new ideas, and are giving out information for NHS students about healthy lifestyles,” Haggerty said.

The students are taking advantage of technology and the growing attraction to social media. They are connecting with teenagers right where they know their work will be seen. All information will come from credible sources, such as physicians or psychologists.

SWAT club’s next meeting will be on February 3rd, 2015. All NHS students who are interested in joining are invited to this information session.