Holmes County Prevention Coalition Receives National Award

The Holmes County Prevention Coalition was honored as a leader in the substance abuse prevention field during the Community Anti-Drug Coalitions of America’s 19th Annual National Leadership Forum February 9-12, 2009. CADCA Chairman General Arthur T. Dean awarded the Chairman’s Award to the Holmes County Prevention Coalition during the Leadership Awards Luncheon on February 12. The Chairman’s Award recognizes a coalition that distinguished itself at the National Coalition Academy by adopting academy training principles and strategies into their daily coalition work to produce measurable outcomes that lead to changes in substance abuse in a county or city. Coalition Coordinator Midge Roberts, Anne Goon, Deputy Health Commissioner, and Kathy Kelly, Family & Children First Council Coordinator, received the award on the Coalition’s behalf.

The Holmes County Prevention Coalition was selected for this honor from more than 35 coalitions who participated in the National Coalition Academy during 2008. The National Coalition Academy is a year-long innovative training program that combines three weeks of classroom experience with distance learning and web support to help communities sustain a highly effective anti-drug coalition. Through a comprehensive approach of integrating “core competencies” and “essential processes” with the Strategic Prevention Framework used by the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration (SAMHSA) to guide substance abuse prevention efforts across the nation, the goal of the academy is to create teams of change agents skilled at community problem solving.

Midge Roberts and Anne Goon represented the Holmes County Prevention Coalition in the Academy. They then led the Coalition in applying the tools and principles taught in the Academy. To successfully graduate from the National Coalition Academy, each coalition was required to prepare 5 products- a Community Needs Assessment, Logic Model, Strategic Action Plan, Evaluation Plan, and Sustainability Plan- to demonstrate their understanding and usage of the Strategic Prevention Framework in their local efforts.