Tune in
April 24th at
9:30pm as
WEDU presents the 2008
Florida's
Kids & Alcohol: A Town Hall Meeting:
"A Parent's Perspective"
Click here to watch this program now
Now in its third year, this series addresses the issues surrounding underage drinking in the state of Florida. This was an in-depth discussion on the harmful effects of underage drinking. Designed to increase community awareness, the meeting provided an opportunity for parents, teachers, officials, youth and other community members to voice their concerns and suggest ideas for preventing young people from using alcohol.
Moderated by Laura McElroy, PIO for the Tampa Police Department, this special one-hour WEDU Town Hall meeting was taped in front of a live audience at Gibbs High School (4/17/08), and features a panel of local parents, teachers and community experts including
- Marcia Izzo: Parent and nurse with the Pinellas County School System.
- Carol Conaway: Program Chair for the Florida PTA. Former Pinellas County Council PTA chair.
- Ellen Snelling: Parent and co-chair of the Tampa Alcohol Coalition and a member of the Hillsborough County Drug Alliance.
- Rosemary Armstrong: Mother of three and serves on the Berkeley Prep Parents’ Club Speaker’s Committee and chairs the board’s scholarship and financial aid committee.
- Holli Morris: Mother of three and has served as President of the Berkeley Prep Parents’ Club and currently chairs the Parents’ Club Speaker’s Committee.
- Jerry Theophilopoulos: Parent and Personal Injury and Criminal Law Attorney.
- Le’esther Davis-Williams: Independent Training Consultant with 40 years experience in the Human Services field. She is a mother of six, and a grandmother.
- Approximately 20% of junior high school students have recently consumed alcohol; that number reaches 35% of high school sophomores and skyrockets to almost half of all high school seniors.
- Every year approximately 5,000 people under the age of 21 die from alcohol related incidents.
- The rate of fatal crashes among alcohol-impaired drivers between ages 16 and 20 is more than twice that of older drivers.
- Kids who start drinking before they are 15 years old are five times more likely to have alcohol problems as an adult.
- Alcohol is the most widely used substance of abuse among America's youth. Underage drinking is more likely to kill young people than all illegal drugs combined.
Webcast
As the conversation continued – WEDU took the opportunity to record the ongoing dialogue between the audience and the panelists and present that discussion here in this special webcast. There were a handful of questions that prompted several areas of discussion including:
- The challenges of getting kids into treatment and the kinds of treatment that are available to kids who are already dependent on alcohol or other drugs
- How schools can work with parents and coalitions to educate students about the dangers of alcohol
- Expanded discussion of the realities of alcohol advertising and how easy it is for underage people to be influenced by that marketing
