17-year-old Sophie G, from the Agoura Hills area, won third place in the “Say It Straight Up” video contest presented by Straight Up in 2011. She created “Choice,” a touching black-and-white video, in which a young girl mourns the death of a friend killed by a drunk driver.
Above the Influence offers up some cool, interactive artwork that you can feature on your mobile device or computer — and you can post animations about what being “above the influence” means to you on your social network profile. Each design in the “Symbol-ize Yourself” section contains thoughts and reasons why living Above the [...]
The red specks highlight where the integrity of the brain’s white matter is significantly less in the teens who binge drink, compared to those who do not. Photo: Susan Tapert/Tim McQueeny Many parents, though familiar with the idea that drinking alcohol can cause brain damage, are not familiar with newer research that points out how [...]
Heather O’Neill, coordinator for Straight Up’s Let’s Talk program, presents a series of helpful posts, resources, and articles on a regular basis for the Straight Up blog. Parents have very tough jobs. There is so much that goes into raising a child, so much that one needs to know, to learn, to do for these [...]
Straight Up Ventura County held its first ever Leadership Retreat on May 14th, and I was very impressed. Not because of the work that the Straight Up staff put into the event — although I should say here that it took a lot of work to pull this thing off, and the staff members did [...]
Youth correspondent Emilie A, a high school student from Thousand Oaks, has been participating in Straight Up Reality Parties as an actor since 2007. Emilie, like all Straight Up youth, want parents to be more aware of dangerous party norms and risky behaviors associated with underage and binge drinking, and to help parents understand what [...]
Are they going to do it anyway? Can parents really make a difference?
Recently I was guided to an interesting and helpful website A Parent’s Guide to the Teen Brain, presented by The Partnership for a Drug-Free America, Treatment Research Institute, and WGBH Educational Foundation. This site is fact and personal stories mixed together well using interactive pages and films. There are short films about brain development, teen [...]
The Let’s Talk Series #9 – How much do parents truly know about their teens’ realities?
Heather O’Neill, coordinator for Straight Up’s Let’s Talk program, presents a series of helpful posts, resources, and articles on a regular basis for the Straight Up blog. Parents have very tough jobs. There is so much that goes into raising a child, so much that one needs to know, to learn, to do for these [...]