alcoHELP JOINS THE ARMY

15 May 2013

As part of Crucial Crew, a long-running project aimed at informing children due to start secondary school about the risks they could face in the near future, alcoHELP delivered a series of high-impact education workshops.
Co-founder and trustee of alcoHELP, Debby Peirson who personally delivered the sessions, comments:

“Young people certainly have an awareness that alcohol is not ‘good’ for them, but when asked which organ alcohol affects first and foremost, 90% of the time they will say the liver. Of course, the liver is susceptible to damage from alcohol consumption, but we focus our efforts on educating Year 6’s on both the short-term and long-term impact on the brain itself.

“Film footage of somebody who started drinking at a young age is shown with resulting images of their brain – this itself leaves both a shocking and long-lasting message with the pupils.”

Terry Martin, Co-founder and trustee of alcoHELP, adds:

"Crucial Crew is now an established event which almost every school in the city comes back to year after year. In the space of 90 minutes pupils get a chance to take part in six 15-minute interactive sessions led by professionals, including ourselves, Police Offices, paramedics, the fire brigade and road safety representatives who aim to make them aware of the dangers they could face as they approach their teens.

"It is incredibly important that we continue to focus our efforts on informing young people at a time when we are able to give them the information they need to make an informed decision about alcohol before reaching secondary school age.

“The cold hard fact is that in a group of ten 10 -11 year olds, statistically, two will already be drinking and will enter into adult life with an alcohol problem. We set up alcoHELP to address these issues and make young people aware that they have choices and can so “no” to peer pressure.”

To drive the message home, Debby also asks the children to put on a pair of ‘goggles’ designed to simulate the effects of alcohol. Whilst the children find it funny at first, they soon realise the difficulty they could find themselves in when asked to find their seats. The resulting conversation after the exercise, without fail, makes the children realise just how dangerous alcohol can be.”