Share How You Fill Your World With Good

Most Colorado teens are NOT using substances!  In fact, Rise Above survey data show that ~90% of middle schoolers and ~80% of high schoolers in DPS did not use in the past 30 days. Does this come as a surprise?  We need your help getting  this messaging out.

The DPS Substance Use Prevention (SUP) Team is hosting a DPS wide competition in collaboration with Rise Above Colorado, the campaign is called Fill Your World With Good.   FILL YOUR WORLD WITH GOOD is a social norms campaign based on specific questions from the Rise Above Colorado Youth Survey. When it comes to substance misuse, teens sometimes hold inaccurate ideas of how many of their peers are actually using alcohol and other drugs. The social norms approach is about closing the gap between people’s misperception and reality. Peer pressure, distorted representations of youth in pop culture, and false notions that “everyone is doing it” or that “experimentation is just part of being a teenager” can negatively shape the way we see our world, influencing how we make our day to day decisions. In turn, holding accurate perceptions, knowing for instance that in reality most teens don’t use alcohol and other drugs, makes embracing healthy choices easier because we know other youth are prioritizing their health and future, too.

What can you do to spread the message?  Enroll your school in the competition and encourage kids to post photos of the healthy activities they are doing.  The school that posts the most healthy activities will win a mural from Rise Above.  Morey MS was the winner last year, on the back is the mural they were able to create with Jonathan from Rise Above. 

The SUP team can bring out postcards, posters, and stickers and you can share these Advisory slides to help school teams kick this off.  Here is a google drive with everything related to the 2024 competition! 

Competition starts 2/1/24 and runs until 4/1/24.  Reach out to Haley or Leah to get on board with spreading this positive messaging.