Creating Opportunities to Achieve Community Health (C.O.A.C.H.) Sports Intervention Initiative

There will be 3 seasons each year of the coach program: Fall, Summer, and Winter. Each basketball season will last 12 weeks, including two, 2-hour sessions per week. One day will consist of 1 hour of youth and/or parent/guardian/family education and 1 hour of practice. The other day each week will include discussions reinforcing the educational material from the COACH project’s three evidence based practices (EBP’s) being presented. These subject matter reinforcement conversations will occur prior to the weekly game between the teams within the league. Youth, parent/guardian/family members present, NCADD staff and coaches will be present and participate in dialogue designed to restate key messages from the specific lessons and provide additional opportunities for emphasis, recall, and processing of the information to increase retention and facilitate attitudinal change.

The youth education component will consist of two EBP programs. The first, focusing on substance use prevention, healthy lifestyle promotion, and resiliency development, is called SPORT Prevention Plus Wellness (PPW)). SPORT PWW is designed to increase health-enhancing behaviors of youth including physical activity, sports participation, healthy eating, getting adequate sleep, and practicing stress control with an emphasis on preventing alcohol and cannabis use. Youth will also get Question, Persuade, and Refer (QPR) training as a condition of participating in the COACH program. QPR is an emergency mental health intervention for recognizing and addressing persons that may be expressing suicidal thoughts. Through this training, parents and youth will be able to detect, screen, identify, and refer at risk individuals to appropriate qualified professionals for support and treatment.

The parent education component includes SPORT PPW, QPR and one additional program — Adverse Childhood Experiences (ACEs). ACEs are potential traumatic events or aspects of the child’s environment that can undermine their sense of safety that occur in childhood and adolescence (0-17 years). Parents will learn through this training the effects of ACEs and the symptoms of toxic stress in youth, strategies that support resilience, as well as seeking support when needed. “C.O.A.C.H. Program leadership offers ACEs and/or QPR trainings to community/youth groups in the Detroit & Greater Wayne County area as well. If interested or have any questions contact: Program Coordinator Da’Shonte Riley at driley@ncadd-detroit.edu or (313) 868-1340 ext.119.