Beyond the Usual Partnership: Nesting Behavior Change Programs into Community Site Curricula

During the past two years of funding from the American Legacy Foundation, Drexel's Young Men's Tobacco Project has been reaching 18-24 year old men not in college with tobacco reduction programs through partnerships with community organizations. This age group, and particularly the young urban men we targeted (undereducated, unemployed, many adjudicated, most using other substances in addition to tobacco) do not utilize traditional tobacco resources. Focus group data indicated that we could reduce access barriers by reaching this population at locations where they were already gathered and invested. We identified potential partners primarily by focusing on organizations that provide job-readiness, GED and life skills programs. Rather than using a more typical approach of asking these organizations to “host” our programs, we embarked on a planning process with directors and staff that would result in integrating our program into their existing curricula. After some experimentation with logistics, our six small group sessions became institutionalized as late morning or lunchtime “classes” with food. Preliminary data from pre and post interviews with directors and staff shows a beneficial impact of the tobacco project on the overall goals and design of the site programs. Data from a standardized exit interview with the directors and/or involved staff at the conclusion of our project, plus a tobacco-staff brainstorming session on collaboration experiences with the sites, will be used to inform the process of integrating our project into the centers while lessening organizational burden.