Tuesday April 11, 2023 | LANGFORD, BC
by Mary P Brooke | Island Social Trends
Last week the federal government sat down with Sooke School District 62 (SD62) reps to discuss a federally-funded SD62 pilot project around helping to prevent substance use and reduce related harms.
The April 3 meeting included a tour of Belmont Secondary School in Langford as well as a brief presentation on the pilot project called ‘Strengthening Substance Use Prevention, Harm Reduction and Pathways to Care’.
“Minister Carolyn Bennett visited with Sooke School District Trustees, district staff and Island Health staff,” says SD62 communications rep Kristen MacGillivray.
Carolyn Bennett is the federal Minister of Mental Health and Addictions and Associate Minister of Health.
Broad discussion group:
“The multi-year funded project ‘Strengthening Substance Use Prevention, Harm Reduction and Pathways to Care’ involves working closely with youth, teachers, counsellors, school administrators and Island Health to help ensure young people develop the knowledge and skills they need to navigate our world and reduce substance use related harms,” according to SD62.
SD62 representation in the room for the April 3 visit included SD62 Board Chair Ravi Parmar, SD62 Trustees Russ Chipps and Allison Watson, and Healthy Schools consultant Cindy Andrew.
Funding and future projects:
The visit was requested by the federal government. It’s not yet known if the project will be refunded and repeated, or whether now the results will be used to inform similar projects across the country.
As the project has been running for a few years, it would have started under the previous SD62 board (2018-2022), also chaired by Parmar.
===== ABOUT THE WRITER & ISLAND SOCIAL TRENDS:
Mary P Brooke is the editor and publisher of Island Social Trends as published daily at islandsocialtrends.ca.
She has been covering politics, business, education and communities through a socioeconomic lens since 2008 on south Vancouver Island (previously as West Shore Voice News, and before that both Sooke Voice News and MapleLine Magazine).
Ms Brooke followed and wrote extensively about the COVID pandemic during 2020-2022, and continues to follow the topic as new developments arise. She has covered Sooke School District 62 (SD62) in depth since 2014.
Among other qualifications, Ms Brooke holds a health sciences B.Sc., a university Certificate in Public Relations, and an industry certificate in digital marketing.
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