Substance Use Awareness: School-Based Strategy

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Substance Use Awareness: School-Based Strategy was developed in partnership with the Alberta Health Services (AHS) Community Health Promotion Services (CHPS) team. The CHPS team works to connect, consult, collaborate, and contribute resources to communities in the Calgary zone. Their mission is to prevent and reduce harms related to alcohol, drugs, and mental health disorders by maximizing the well-being of children, adolescents, and families.

This course replaces:

  • Understanding youth and substance use
  • Substance use and the developing brain and
  • Youth medication use, misuse and abuse.

The four course modules explore the following content:

In Module One, you’ll learn about brain development, risk factors, and protective factors in adolescence. 

Module Two will explore rates of substance use and alcohol use, cultural norms/beliefs, and the continuum of use among adolescents.

In Module Three, you will learn about cannabis, vaping/ electronic smoking products, nicotine, and prescription drug use, and their impacts on adolescents.

Finally, in Module Four, we will discuss effective substance use prevention and conversations, school-based protective factors, implementation, and resources for working with adolescents in the classroom.

Upon completions of this module, you will be able to:

Module 1 

  • Describe how a brain develops in adolescence.
  • Describe how risk factors and protective factors influence substance use.
  • Identify general protective and school-based protective factors.

Module 2 

  • Recognize the rates of substance and alcohol use among adolescents.
  • Differentiate how alcohol affects the brain, body, and actions.
  • Interpret the continuum of substance use.

Module 3

  • Explain the basics around use of cannabis, vaping, and electronic smoking products.
  • Explain use of nicotine, vaping, electronic smoking products and prescription drugs with adolescents.

Module 4

  • Demonstrate school-based protective factors in the school.
  • Implement substance use classroom strategies and become familiar with the available resources.
  • Understand the comprehensive approach to address substance use with adolescents in the classroom.

Audience: Middle – High School Educators

Learning Level: Introduction

Estimate time: 60 – 75 minutes