The Office on Children and Youth would like to recognize and thank the RMH Foundation for their generous donation of $3,000, which will surely help make this year’s Teen Health Fair an educational success! The Teen Health Fair is all about providing information to teens regarding their health in such a way that promotes their inquiry on the topics, rather than rote memorization. This method allows students to better retain vital information, as well as help spark their interest to learn more about healthy lifestyles in general. Local agencies and organizations provide interactive booths and games covering topics that range from proper hand-washing to the risks of having sex as a teenager, dating abuse, the dangers of drugs, alcohol, and tobacco, and even nutrition.

The Office on Children and Youth will be hosting its 14^th Annual Teen Health Fair on April 10, 2012 at Turner Ashby High School and on April 11, 2012 at Spotswood High School and will have interactive workshops, exhibits, and a focus on health careers.

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A look into how teen pregnancy affects the Harrisonburg-Rockingham community and what local organizations are doing to create better outcomes for our youth.

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OCY would like to recognize and thank RR Donnelley and the Book Manufacturers’ Institute Inc. for a generous $1,000 donation to the Reading Road Show – Gus Bus! We appreciate your support of this great literacy program.

Gary Calleo, VPM at RR Donnelley Harrisonburg presents the Reading Road Show – Gus Bus with a $1,000 check from the Book Manufacturers’ Institute Inc. Special Projects Grant.

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Mark your calendars for December 10th. It’s time again for the annual OCY Designer Handbag Bingo fundraiser – featuring COACH, Dooney & Bourke, and Vera Bradley bags! We have awesome bags this year … you don’t want to miss it! Specific details are below. We hope you can join us for a fun evening! All proceeds will go towards supporting our direct service programs.

Where: Weyers Cave Community Center

When: Saturday December 10th. Doors open at 3:00 and games start at 5:00

How much: Pre-sale tickets = $10 (for 1 card); Tickets at the door = $15 (for 1 card)

*Each person only needs on ticket. Additional bingo cards can be purchased at the door for $5 each or 5 cards for $20.

**Special pre-sale only games and door prizes!

Call (540) 568-2559 or email reajl@jmu.edu for more information and to order tickets today.

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The Harrisonburg-Rockingham Youth Council is fundraising during the month of May and we would appreciate any and all of your support! Here are the opportunities:

Thursday, May 12th: Cold Stone Creamery of Harrisonburg, 5:00-9:00pm

Youth Council students and leaders will be behind the counter, helping to make your ice cream and, yes, singing! Stop in for a nice cold treat!

Tuesday, May 17th: Chick-fil-A Spirit Night, 5:00-9:00pm

Dine-in at Chick-fil-A to support Youth Council! You can also take  a spin on the “Spinning Wheel” to win coupons and prizes!

Saturday-Sunday, May 21-22nd: Car Wash, Exxon at Rt. 42 and Mt. Clinton Pike

Come and get your cars washed buy Youth Council students! Tickets will be sold in advance for $5 each or you can give a donation during the two days of the car wash. You can get your tickets ahead of time by calling Michael Maurice at (540) 568-6007.

Car Wash Hours:

Saturday, May 21^st: 9:00am-3:00pm

Sunday, May 22^nd: 9:00am-12:00pm

We really hope you can make it to any or all of these fundraising events! Your support will allow the Youth Council to continue its community service and youth leadership devlopment activities throughout Harrisonburg-Rockingham.

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Tomorrow is the National Day to Prevent Teen Pregnancy.  The purpose of this day is to have teens realize the importance of avoiding early and unwanted pregnancy and parenthood through participating online through an interactive quiz and game. 

Teens are asked to go to www.StayTeen.org to participate in the activities and to challenge themselves to think about the consequences of being “in the moment.”  The message of this day and its activities are straight forward: Sex has consequences. 

The website www.StayTeen.org was created to help teens learn more about teen pregnancy and parenting.  “The goal of Stay Teen is to encourage you to enjoy your teen years and avoid the responsibilities that come with too-early pregnancy and parenting.”  It gives teenagers information broken down into different sections to help them understand, learn, and relate to the topic.  The sections the website has are Stay Informed, Features, Stay Tuned, Videos, and Fun and Games. 

The National Day Quiz will be animated for the first time this year.  Young people will also be able to play a new, online game, Invasion of the Myth Monsters, that challenges them to help prevent the spread of myths and untruths about sex, contraception, and pregnancy.   Last year, over half a million teens took the National Day Quiz and since 2002, nearly 4.2 million teenagers have taken it.

Teen pregnancy is on the decline.  Getting out there and reaching out to teenagers to get them to think about the effects are the keys to success.  Programs such as the Teen Pregnancy Prevention Program were created to do just that.  The Teen Pregnancy Prevention Program of the Office on Children and Youth goes to local middle and high schools to get the message out to students in Harrisonburg-Rockingham County area.

The mission of the Teen Pregnancy Prevention Program (TPP) is being addressed through various educational programs and public awareness campaigns established through collaborative efforts between TPP, youth-serving community agencies, public and private school systems, faith communities, colleges and universities, and corporations within the community. 

The programs use three programs to reach out to students, Visions of You, Healthy Choices Presentations, and Choose Respect.  These programs get students thinking about the future and the possible consequences of their actions. 

To find more information about preventing teen pregnancy and parenthood go to www.thenationalcampaign.org.  To get more information on local efforts go to www.findyoureason.org .

Written by Courtney Allen and Katlyn Stiedle

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1. Set time aside everyday to read to your children.
2. Surround your children with an ample amount of reading material.
3. Have time to gather your family and create reading time.
4. Have a wide variety of reading material on hand for your children.
5. Encourage the development of regular library visits.
6. Monitor your child’s reading progress.
7. Keep an eye out for reading problems and take steps to improve them.
8. Finding problems in your child’s reading skills early is important their future reading development.
9. Use reading aids if necessary (ie: computer programs and books on tape).
10.  Last but not least show enthusiasm and excitement for your child’s reading accomplishments.

Compiled by Mary Kim

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This year’s Teen Health Fair was held April 4th-6th at Harrisonburg High School, Broadway High School, and East Rockingham High School. Various agencies and organizations set up interactive booths and games all throughout the high school gymnasiums sharing information about many different health topics relevant to teens. Topics covered everything from proper hand-washing to the risks of having sex as a teenager, dating abuse, the dangers of drugs, alcohol, and tobacco, and even nutrition. By participating in the Teen Health Fair, students were able to educate themselves without the confines of a classroom. One student when talking about the Teen Health Fair said, “It was helpful, educational, and way better than learning the information in a classroom.”

Thank You to everyone who helped make this year’s Teen Health Fair a success!

Event Sponsors:

CCAA (Campus Coalition on Alcohol Abuse)

Gold’s Gym

Cargill

Thanks to those providing food donations for vendor lunches:

Aramark

Mr. J’s

Jimmy Johns

Papa Johns

Dominos

Qdoba

And a Special Thank You to Harrisonburg High School, Broadway High School, East Rockingham High School, all of the vendors, organizations, and agencies, and people who donated their time effort to work at the Teen Health Fair!

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We wanted to send out a big Thank-You to everyone who helped make this year’s Lucky Duck Race a huge success! We sold over 1,700 ducks (the most ever!) and raised over $7000 to support OCY programs! Congratulations to the winners of the Duck Race:

1st Place: Meris Mandernach (#403)

2nd Place: Steve Manning (#1631)

3rd Place: Susannah Lepley (#1506)

And also a big congratulations to the winners of OCY’s Inner-Office Competition! Kim Hartzler-Weakley sold 230 tickets, Jennifer Rea sold 212 tickets, and Kim Ward sold 195 tickets. Way to go! Now we just have to figure out an outfit for Josh Diamond to wear one day to the office. Any suggestions?

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In October 2010, Youth Council conducted an environmental scan to investigate how much access youth had to alcohol as well as how alcohol is marketed to youth. Youth Council members headed out into different parts of the community armed with FlipCams to record what they found and capture their thoughts. The final project was included in an educational video on underage drinking that will be used throughout the state to educate youth and parents about the dangerous affects alcohol can have on adolescent development. The documentary was produced by the Strong Families/Great Youth Coalition and WHSV-TV3.

Enjoy the video!

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