7 students from our TODAY club reflect on their time at CADCA Forum

In February, I was one of the seven students from the TODAY club who had the opportunity to go to CADCA's National Leadership Forum in National Harbor with the NHS Cares staff. Like NHS Cares, the Community Anti-Drug Coalitions of America (CADCA) is a non-profit organization with the purpose of supporting and educating communities to lower drug abuse.

The group left on Sunday, February 2nd, and spent 5 days in National Harbor, Maryland learning about how we could improve our community in regards to drug misuse and abuse. On Monday we attended lectures, while Tuesday and Thursday were more hands-on sessions for students. Some of the lectures we attended focused on: community effects on the legalization of marijuana, the vaping epidemic, suicide prevention, and the opioid crisis.

On Wednesday, February 5th, we went to Capitol Hill in Washington, D.C. We met with representatives for senators Pat Toomey and Bob Casey and met Brian Fitzpatrick himself. With each of them, we spoke in-depth about local issues and how they could implement new policies to decrease abuse of drugs and alcohol, especially with youth. A few weeks later, Brian Fitzpatrick voted in support of H.R. 2339 (a bill that revises requirements related to the safety, sale, and advertisement of tobacco products, including electronic nicotine delivery systems), and mentioned us and our coalition on The House floor. While In D.C., we met other student coalitions also from Pennsylvania. One of the coalitions was from Philadelphia, and with them, we discussed the similarities and differences between the problems we face in our respective communities.

The overall experience was not only informative but a lot of fun. We enjoyed our time spent in National Harbor and Washington, D.C. and are happy that we had the opportunity to make a difference in how communities can fight against drug misuse.

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