Troubled Teens Resources

Teen crisis intervention via positive peer pressure is an effective method of teen help employed in many schools for troubled teens, with very good results. It is also employed, in various forms, throughout the country’s public schools via various programs - Teen Court being one most parents have heard of.

When a teen helps their peers by apprising them of the dangers of drug use, they are going to find themselves meeting with some opposition and hostility, but their efforts are valuable and commendable. That is how positive peer pressure is being deployed by Safe Teens Empowerment Project in one California middle school.

“That is going to be our target population,” said Badon. “Alcohol is available in many of these children’s homes, so they actually get alcohol just by tapping into the parent’s alcohol supply. Marijuana is available, too. If you are a middle school kid you can get marijuana from high school kids. So, these are not adult predators giving drugs to these young kids, they know how to get it.”

Participants in the program will also be present at DUI check points and participate in peer mediation. They needn’t be honor students to participate. The idea is to get a body of students that can relate to the many teen groups that they will encounter.

” Lisette Hernandez… said she wished she had a friend pull her aside to help steer her away from substance abuse…She admitted that she might not have listened at first to friends who didn’t drink or use drugs.

“But, there is always something that is going to stick in your head, maybe not today, but later on,” she said.”
(source)

The world of today’s adolescents isn’t all about teen age drug abuse. A frustrated teen helps put another perspective out there afterbeing disappointed in discovering that a search for teen topics produced some unpleasant Google results.

It seems that Google associates the word ‘teenager’ most often with; addiction, drugs, alcohol, binge drinking, sex and violence. You know, the usual array of topics covered here. Because they do reflect an unhappy reality. But is also true that teens really are most associated with negatives, not only in what the press chooses to cover, but in the way that Hollywood chooses to portray them.

In order to set the record straight, the young writer offers the following statistics, and also asks that we give teenagers “a chance. Listen to our half of the story. You never know; we just might surprise you.”

“According to Josh McDowell and the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services:

• “43 percent (of teenagers) talk to family or friends about religious matters in a typical day, (and) 41 percent talk to family or friends about politics in a typical day.” (1998)

• “70 percent of teens have daily conversations with their mothers about an important issue in their life.” (1998)

• “More than 90 percent of young people (16-19-year-olds) are either enrolled in school or employed, and 27 percent are both enrolled in school and employed.” (2003)

• “Teens describe themselves as: happy (92 percent); responsible (91 percent); self reliant (86 percent); optimistic about my future (82 percent); very intelligent (79 percent); and physically attractive (74 percent).”
(source)