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Center for College Health and Safety
The Center for College
Health and Safety (CCHS)
at EDC assists colleges and universities in developing, implementing,
and evaluating prevention policies and programs that address a
broad range of health and safety issues at institutions of higher
education. CCHS also conducts research to expand current knowledge
about effective strategies in promoting sound mental and physical
health and preventing alcohol, tobacco, and other drug abuse; violence
and injuries; and high-risk sexual activity. CCHS services include
professional development, technical assistance, publications, and
a broad array of electronic communication resources.
CCHS programs include the U.S. Department of Education’s Higher
Education Center for Alcohol and Other Drug Abuse and Violence
Prevention, which is the nation’s
primary resource for assisting colleges and universities in preventing
substance abuse. Another is the College Alcohol Prevention Initiative,
a wide-ranging project that promotes emerging approaches to campus
substance abuse prevention. Other Center projects include the College
Tobacco Prevention Resource and Campus
Mental Health Best Practices Dissemination Project, as
well as variety of stand-alone consulting and training events.
In addition, the Center has recently concluded the Social
Norms Marketing Research Project, a
national, multi-site study that is testing the effectiveness
of campus-based media campaigns in reducing high-risk drinking
among college students. It is the first large study of its kind
to evaluate the effect of social norms marketing on student perceptions
of drinking norms and actual drinking behavior. The Center has
also concluded the implementation phase of the Social
Norms Alcohol Problem Prevention for Youth pilot study and
is completing articles documenting the findings of this school-
and community-based media campaign to correct misperceptions
of high school student drinking norms.
Challenges
Heavy drinking and other drug use, violence, hate crimes, and high-risk
sexual practices among college students result in injury, property
damage, unplanned pregnancies, sexually transmitted diseases, decreased
academic performance, rape, and even death. Research demonstrates
that education and intervention strategies that target individual
students have a limited effect. A broader approach, which involves
changing the physical, social, economic, cultural, and legal environment
on campuses and in the surrounding communities, has been shown
to be more effective.
Implementing such a comprehensive approach requires a fundamental
shift in the way in which prevention and higher education professionals
address these issues, moving beyond individual education strategies
to broader environmental strategies for prevention and intervention.
It also requires prevention professionals, educators, community
leaders, law enforcement personnel and others to work together
towards a common goal of broad-based change through coalitions.
Mission
CCHS’s primary focus is to develop and implement environmental
approaches that link student behavior to the larger social and
policy environment. The center works with institutions of higher
education and surrounding communities to implement, evaluate, and
refine policies and programs to address heavy drinking, tobacco
and other drug use, violence, hate crimes, and high-risk sexual
practices among college students, with a focus on putting research-based
programs and policies into practice.
Strategies
CCHS provides a range of services to institutions of higher education
and the communities in which they are situated, drawing upon the
rich and diverse capability of program staff to execute our mission:
- Strategic
planning services to campus and community teams, including senior
campus administrators, prevention professionals, community leaders,
faculty, and students
- Technical assistance on
specific challenges to college and university administration,
staff, faculty, students, and concerned community representatives
- Creation and dissemination of publications
and materials to meet the diverse
needs of the post-secondary education community
- Intensive, on-site training to
increase capacity of prevention, higher education and community-based
professionals in several content and skill areas
- Identification and
dissemination of promising prevention practices, interventions,
policies, and enforcement strategies
- Research to explore promising and emerging interventions and
prevention strategies
- Use of the Internet and other electronic media
to educate the field on research and best practices in prevention
and intervention
Projects and Results
Below
is a list of selected CCHS projects and results. (For
a full listing and descriptions of CCHS’s current and
past projects, please visit the CCHS
projects page.
- CCHS has helped mobilize and support more than 45 statewide
initiatives to
reduce alcohol and other drug use through the work of local
campus and community coalitions.
- Baseline data
from the Social
Norms Marketing Research Project indicate
that college students overestimate peer alcohol use
and underestimate their peers’ desire for stricter
alcohol policies.
- The Presidents Leadership
Group convened
by CCHS in 1997, marked the first time that a national group
of college presidents met to review various approaches for
curbing student substance use and to develop a comprehensive
plan of action. It resulted in Be Vocal, Be Visible,
Be Visionary, a publication and video for college presidents
and administrators.
- CCHS’s resource Web site, www.CampusHealthandSafety.org,
is a database-driven online resource for prevention professionals
and others concerned with reducing high-risk drinking, drug use,
and violence among college students. There also is a section
devoted to mental health issues in this population. The site
includes thousands of resources organized by prevention approach
and research topic.
- Moving to Action, a two-day interactive professional
development workshop, has been offered to teams representing
more than 2,500 campus and community leaders across the country.
Participating campuses have since expanded existing programs
to include environmental prevention strategies, and created frameworks
to establish campus and community coalitions.
- CCHS works with the
Pennsylvania Liquor Control Board to develop and test an environmental
strategy to reduce alcohol sales and curtail “predatory” alcohol
marketing practices in two campus communities.
- BASICS Statewide Implementation: The Brief
Alcohol Screening and Intervention for College Students (BASICS),
an evidence-based, individual-focused intervention, is
currently in various stages of implementation across several
states.
- The UMADD Evaluation is a process and
outcome evaluation of a new, campus-based initiative of Mothers
Against Drunk Driving (MADD). A primary goal of UMADD is
to work with campus and local law enforcement to increase
enforcement of underage drinking and impaired driving laws
through roll call briefings, recognition events, and other
activities tailored to each school.
- CCHS has provided consultation
services to more than 2,000 of the nation’s two- and four-year
colleges.
Products and Publications
CCHS distributes more than 100 publications, ranging from brief
fact sheets and prevention updates to guides and manuals, a selection
of which are described below:
- Safe
Lanes on Campus: A Guide for Preventing Impaired Driving
and Underage Drinking. (December
2003), is a comprehensive manual thathelps senior
administrators, faculty, staff, students, community leaders,
enforcement agencies, and campus and community coalitions
in choosing prevention strategies appropriate to their campus
and community to address driving under the influence of alcohol
by students of all ages and alcohol use by students under
the legal drinking age.
- Catalyst, the
Web-based newsletter of the Higher Education Center for Alcohol
and Other Drug Abuse and Violence Prevention, publicizes events,
resources, and reports on innovative alcohol, other drug, and
violence prevention policies and programs. Catalyst is
published electronically three times a year and reaches an audience
of more than 5,000.
- HEC/News,
an electronic news bulletin published by the Higher Education
Center for Alcohol and Other Drug Abuse and Violence Prevention,
includes press reports on alcohol, other drug, and violence prevention
issues on campuses.
Funders
- U.S. Department of Education
- Robert Wood Johnson Foundation
- National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism
- Pennsylvania Liquor Control Board
- Ittleson Foundation
- Inflexxion
- Tobacco Technical Assistance Consortium
Directors
Steering Committee
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