Whiz Kids: The Youth Action Council

A small group of dedicated middle schoolers are paving the way for their voices to be heard loud and clear by adult members of the community. The fledgling Youth Action Council, started at the Woodbury Middle School in the fall, is dedicated to empowering the middle school community so that they can be heard on the issues that affect them now and later in high school.

A survey given to the region’s seventh through twelfth grade students two years ago, where 79 percent of students said they feel they are not being valued in the community, prompted a discussion by and for the middle and high schoolers called, ‘What’s Up With Our Kids?’ Out of this program, held in the fall, where students were able to freely talk about issues affecting them and their schools, the Youth Action Council was formed as a way to get the dialogue started.

Now, a small group of Woodbury Middle School students, picked by their teachers, meet weekly to discuss issues, plan ways to help improve and safeguard their school community and empower themselves to be heard.

“A lot of kids may not be happy about something in the community, but they feel they don’t have a voice,” says Gunner Hoffman, an 8^th grader at WMS. “I would like to be able to help them be a voice and get their ideas out there.” Hoffman adds that without a dialogue opened, the kids of this generation won’t feel empowered. “Kids in our generation need to know they are shapers of the world.”

Courtney Carlson says it is an honor to have been chosen to sit on the Youth Action Council “to know that what I say or my opinion in choices that are being made counts.” The seventh-grader adds that one thing she wants her peers to know is that with the creation of the YAC, “the community does care about our opinions.”

The WMS Youth Action Council is also an arm of the Advocates For Substance Abuse Prevention. The ASAP group, which began 10 years ago, is made up of students, parents, teachers and community members and is charged with finding and offering prevention and educational programs for kids in the community on various issues ranging from bullying to drug and alcohol prevention. There is also a Youth Action Council at Nonnewaug High School.

According to Maryanne Van Aken, a member of ASAP for the last decade, the results of the survey prompted a discussion and was the impetus to get the YAC started. “The focus is to get kids to sit at the table with us,” Van Aken says. “They know what is going on and what they need from us as adults.”

WMS Health Teacher Lee Hubbard, who advises the YAC, said that with ASAP’s role in helping  to keep kids in the community safe, beginning that dialogue in middle school is invaluable. “Put them together and the purpose of YAC and ASAP is to keep kids valued so they will stay safe, not use drugs and talk about what they see in the community,” Hubbard says.

For seventh grader Erin Bottino, she feels that the creation of the Youth Action Council  “will let the younger generation feel like if they do have the guts to speak out about something, they won’t be judged for what they say.”

Whether it is writing a letter to the Board of Selectmen, speaking at a Board of Education meeting or talking to your teachers or parents about an issue, being able to feel like you can do that, Hoffman adds, “is huge for a small community. We are talking about bigger stuff here. We are young adults.”

Anastasia Schneider echoes this sentiment adding that with this group formed, it should be made clear to all of her middle school peers, and all kids, “that it is okay to say what they are thinking.” Schneider, who enters high school in the fall, thinks that more surveys of kids’ opinions need to be done in Region 14 because the last was one certainly enlightening.

Schneider says that the YAC will hopefully give kids enough tools to be able to do what they know is right even when it is hard. “Cool is not always the best,” she says. “Be popular for the right reasons.”

Bottino agrees. “Be valued for who you are,” she says. “You don’t have to always go with the flow.”

“These kids are all role models here to pave the way for other youth to do the right thing,” Hubbard says. “If the dialogue starts in middle school, kids can continue with it in high school. The Youth Action Council bridges that gap between Woodbury Middle and Nonnewaug High School. We need to explore issues, need to make decisions.”

Members of the YAC will be working together with ASAP and others this weekend at the DEA sponsored National Drug Take Back Day on Saturday, April 30 from 10 a.m. to 2 p.m. at the Woodbury Police Department. The free and anonymous event is an opportunity for members of the public  to properly dispose of unused, unwanted and unknown and expired prescriptions and over-the-counter medications.

The event is sponsored by ASAP, the WMS and NHS Youth Action Councils, Woodbury Resident Trooper and Police Department and the Woodbury-Bethlehem Parent Connection. The YAC will be on hand with signs and flyers and to direct people where to go.

While the YAC group is still young, Hubbard says they will look to other areas like Region 15 and Newtown who have their own Youth Action Councils to see what is working.

“We will continue to get more members, create more strategies and talk honestly about awareness and support,” Hubbard adds. “We are going to keep kids educated and informed to make safe decisions. Our Youth Action Council will pave the way. Kids listen to their peers.”

“It’s important to be a part of this,” Schneider adds. “We can make a real difference. It’s now our job to do that.”

“Empowering our youth,” Hoffman adds. “That is our main goal.”

For more information on the Drug Take Back Program, call Woodbury Police Department at 203-263-3400.