The Cannon County Substance Abuse Prevention Coalition will be having their monthly meeting this Thursday February 12th at the Woodbury Lions Club Building. Anyone in the Cannon County community is invited to come and join in on the meeting. There is no cost to attend and no cost to be a member.
The Coalition provides substance abuse prevention and education to not only the public but also to Cannon County Schools. In the past quarter key activities included the delivery of prevention education through the Health Smarts curriculum, providing students with evidence-based instruction on substance misuse prevention, personal responsibility, and essential life skills. In addition, the organization actively supported and participated in Red Ribbon Week, coordinating school-based educational activities and awareness efforts to reinforce drug-free messaging and encourage positive youth engagement.
To further strengthen school partnerships, a school collaboration meeting was held in January to coordinate and plan upcoming prevention educational activities. The meeting supported alignment with school priorities and ensures continued collaboration for future prevention programming.
Upcoming community events will be a parent/caregiver training night along with a game night on March 20th. The Day of Prevention, Recovery, and Hope event on April 11th and a Drug Take Back Day on April 25th. Information about these free events will be available at Thursday’s meeting which will take place from 11a-12noon.
The guest speaker for the meeting is Saul Malek.
Saul Malek is a professional speaker specializing in gambling addiction prevention and education. Saul developed a gambling addiction as a college sophomore, losing money, time, relationships, and nearly his life. Since entering recovery in 2019, he has become an in-demand speaker, sharing his story with schools (both K-12 and colleges and universities), athlete mental health organizations, suicide prevention groups, parent groups, popular news outlets (including New York Times, National Public Radio, Public Broadcasting Service, and Dallas Morning News). He has keynoted conferences including the Connecticut Council on Problem Gambling annual conference, the Wisconsin Council on Problem Gambling annual conference, and Mental Health America Greater Dallas Adolescent Symposium. He appeared on Dr Phil Primetime and was a TedX speaker at the University of Alabama at Birmingham.
