Altar Valley Comprehensive Substance Abuse Prevention Program

The Altar Valley School District, on behalf of its Community Substance Abuse Advisory Council, designed a multi-faceted substance abuse prevention effort in response to the Arizona State Incentive Grant initiative in the fall of 1999. This effort focused on the implementation of an acclaimed science-based substance abuse prevention curriculum, the Life Skills Training program, developed by Dr. Gilbert J. Botvin in 1979. This program was implemented for a period of three years, with a combination of 6th, 7th and 8th graders each year.

The Life Skills Training program offers health and drug education as well as the promotion of self-awareness and personal development. The program provided students with factual information on the causes and effects of drug abuse, and also aimed to strengthen certain life skills among students, such as decision making, anxiety management, media awareness, resistance to peer pressure, communication and social skills. LeCroy & Milligan Associates, Inc. implemented the first ever evaluation of Botvin's Life Skills Training program delivered within a Southwestern Hispanic community. The main evaluation component looked at program impacts, by assessing changes in students' drug use and their intentions to use drugs after completion of the program, as well as changes in students' knowledge, attitudes and life skills.