September Calendar Resources

My Good Deed (September 11)

Join thousands of others who are taking the My Good Deed pledge to observe 9/11 this year by helping others in need—volunteer, give blood, make a donation to a charity, give something away, or just help a friend, neighbor, or relative. Visit www.mygooddeed.org for more information.

National Kids Day (September 20)

According to a survey done by the Boys & Girls Clubs of America, U.S. parents and children agree they want to spend meaningful time together, but tend to disagree about what it takes to make family interaction meaningful. One-in-five children say that they have "too little" or "hardly any" meaningful time with parents. Your club can help promote awareness that kids do want to spend time with parents by promoting this worthwhile day. Spending time with your children can help influence them to make good choices. By talking to them, parents can create an opportunity to talk about alcohol & drug use, buckling up, and what to do if they are faced with riding with someone whose driving is impaired.

FLORIDA SADD Student Leadership Summit Find the Hero Inside You (September 19-21)

The 2008 FLORIDA SADD Student Leadership Summit will be held on Friday, September 19, thru Sunday, September 21, 2008 at the LaQuinta Winter Park in Orlando, Florida. FLORIDA SADD wants to create an opportunity where more students can come together and share in the SADD experience.

The purpose of this leadership summit is for students and advisors to come together to learn effective chapter management & leadership strategies. The summit includes workshops on programming, recruitment, retention, and chapter management. Participants will share ideas and experiences during team building exercises and at workshops facilitated by advisors and students. A maximum of 200 participants will be permitted to attend the Student Leadership Summit. Therefore, please send in your registration early. For a registration packet go to the following link: http://www.floridasadd.org/pdfs/2008_leadership_summit_packet.pdf The deadline to register for the leadership summit is Friday, September 12, 2008.

SADD National’s – The Power of Friendship

Join more than 1000 SADD Chapters nationwide by participating in The Power of Friendship Campaign. This SADD message is a powerful one! It gives students the opportunity to reach out to everyone in their school and community by encouraging them to take responsibility for their safety and for the safety of their friends. You can download the campaign kit at http://www.saddonline.com/pdf/fall_instructions.pdf

International Day of Peace (September 21)

The United Nations General Assembly has declared September 21 of each year as an International Day of Peace. The Assembly affirmed that the Day be observed as a day of global ceasefire and non-violence, an invitation to all nations and people to honor a cessation of hostilities during the Day. The following web site has suggested activities as well as links to other web sites. http://www.internationaldayofpeace.org

Yellow Ribbon Week (September 7-13)

Order a card for every student in your middle/high school from the Yellow Ribbon Suicide Prevention Program (see web link above). Each day during Yellow Ribbon Week have a SADD club member speak about suicide over the morning announcements. Show a video (either from the Yellow Ribbon Program or ask your Reference Librarian to help you find one) about suicide and explain to students that if they are ever in this situation they do have someone that they can talk with. Distribute a list of agencies, phone numbers, your school counselor, or a “safe” person for anyone to call if they are suicidal or think someone is. http://www.yellowribbon.org/Week.html

Family Day (September 22)

http://www.floridafamilyday.com and http://www.casafamilyday.org
The Florida Office of Drug Control is planning a publicity campaign to increase awareness of Family Day, on the fourth Monday in September. Family Day is observed nationally and in many states to recognize the link between families eating dinner together and lower teen drug use. In fact, studies show teens who rarely eat dinner with their parents are 72% more likely than the average teen to use drugs, drink, and smoke.

Prevent Underage Drinking Campaign (September 12)

A key approach to preventing alcohol use among young people is the teaching of such "life skills" as decision making and communication.

Find out if there is a teacher or administrator at your school who does workshops on these topics. If you have none, then call the Safe and Drug Free Coordinator (http://www.firn.edu/doe/besss/sddfs_coordinators.htm) in your area and ask him/her to help you find someone.

Host a workshop or school-wide presentation on a life-skills topic such as effective communication, dealing with anger, leadership skills, time management, learning styles, good etiquette, etc.

Conduct an environmental scan. Pick a location where students hang out, count the references to alcohol & tobacco, billboards, signs, etc. Go to grocery stores and locate where there is alcohol advertising and see if they conduct wine/beer tasting. Then let someone such as the mayor of your city or the store manager know what you found.

Back to School Campaign (September 10)

Now is a good time to promote awareness of your club. The following are some ideas to do that.

Create a Survey - Set up a display booth in the cafeteria or other area with a high volume of traffic and ask students to fill out a short survey about their attitudes and concerns on teen issues. Use that information to present workshops on those topics, to create awareness campaigns specific to the needs of your school, to put in your school newsletter, and/or to use in PSA’s. Keep the surveys short and offer students a gift for completing them (chocolate kisses, etc.).
Open House- Set up safe driving/drug-free booth at your school's open house night. Ask parents to take a "Contract For Life" home.
Resource Room- Check with your school/public library to see if they have a drug and alcohol information resource room or area. Offer to help obtain material for the room. Use money from fund-raisers to purchase new items.

SADD Membership Month

Membership Drive- Set up a table during school registration and/or during scheduled lunch times. Offer juice, water, cookies, etc.

Put up posters about SADD around school (like the ones that arrived in your Back To School box of goodies). Be sure to make them fun and easy to read, with all the information available at a glance. Students walk down the hall in a hurry – your poster must "jump" out at them.

Use the slicks (high gloss, black and white sheets) that are included in your FL SADD Back To School box. One is to announce your meeting times and the other to announce any special events that you may be having. Do not use the originals. Copy them onto white paper, add the information that is specific to your club event, and then duplicate it onto brightly colored paper. Keep the original to use over and over again.
Visit classes that have interest in health and safety issues - drivers education, health classes, etc.
Invite all class officers to your first meeting. Make a sign to show the growing membership. Make it a % contest for each class.
BYOB- Have a party with the theme "BYOB" -- "Bring Your Own Banana." Offer refreshments and ice cream for banana splits.
SADD Spirit Day- Have all members wear their SADD shirts on meeting days or a specific day each month.
Game Night- Sponsor a game night for 4th through 6th graders from your feeder school. Have members bring their own board games for a better variety. Plan several different contests during the night. If it goes well, sponsor the night once a month.
B-I-N-G-O Night- Have your club sponsor a Bingo Night where members will run several Bingo games and offer prizes to the winners. (SADD mugs, T-shirts, pens, etc., could be several of the prizes.)

Visit freshman classes and give out a SADD information sheet. Tell them what your SADD chapter does and invite them to join. Make the meeting sound fun and appealing. Provide a sign up sheet for each class.
Follow up with a special meeting for freshmen. They may be especially skittish about just showing up at a general meeting, so cultivate them first and make them feel welcome.
Host a special informational meeting for kids who are just interested in finding out more about SADD. Provide pizza, ice cream or other snacks.
Make announcements about your meetings on the PA. Be sure your announcements are clear, concise, and creative – students tend to "tune out" announcements.
Put invitations to join on the windshields of students’ cars.
Write an article for your school newsletter about SADD and its members, activities and goals.
Download the SADD screensaver onto every school computer by going to www.floridasadd.org, click on SADD MATERIALS, and click on Download the SADD screensaver for your computer.

Chain of Life Drive (September 15)

The Chain of Life is a great activity to start off the school year. Start by providing everyone with a piece of paper – during lunch or homeroom is generally a good time. Invite each student and staff member to sign his or her name on the paper. Your SADD members then loop every piece together, making an interlocking chain with the links.

Customize the activity to your school. Divide the chain into colors by each class and hold a competition to see who can achieve 100% participation. If you don’t challenge the individual classes, challenge the entire school for 100% participation. Keep a record and inform everyone by daily announcement indicating how close you are to 100%.

Class slogans can also be incorporated in the chain, or each person can glue a picture of himself or herself onto the inside of the chain. Hang the chain in a prominent place in the school with a sign that says, “Don’t Break the Chain of Life.”

At the culmination of this activity, you may choose to leave the chain up for a longer period or bring it out for special at-risk seasons, such as Christmas, New Year’s, prom, and graduation, to remind everyone not to break the chain during the upcoming season. New signs and slogans may be added to reference the season. In this way, the chain serves to reinforce the idea of caring, responsibility and making good decisions.

Many schools have found this activity to be so effective that they have expanded the Chain of Life to the middle school and also the community. Invite the mayor, selectmen, city councilors, school committee members, parents, and community members to come to a central location to sign a link and connect it to the chain. You can also do this activity as part of your safe summer campaign to reinforce the need to have the entire community involved in the effort to end underage drinking, impaired driving and other destructive decisions.