SPEAK Week to give voice to WHS students

Kelly Horan, Raider Times staff|February 21, 2014

Peer Leaders is launching the second step to its “I Am” campaign and hope to debut a video during SPEAK week at Watertown High this March. The video is to include students from WHS in what they consider their natural habitat displaying their talents to the world.

This is Phase 2 of the “I Am” campaign, which aims to recognize parts of students’ identity which they feel good about and is a motivating factor to make healthy decisions.

Stemming as a subcommittee from the Watertown Youth Coalition, Peer Leaders has been a stronghold for years at Watertown High.

As a group that is dedicated to helping teens make healthy decisions about alcohol and drugs, the group prides itself on the use of teens to try and combat the problem by building them up and empowering them to make their own decisions.

The Watertown Youth Coalition, which is overseen by the Wayside Multi-Service Center, is a community coalition of youth, parents, residents, educators, and many others in the community committed to promoting healthy and positive lifestyles among the Watertown youth. To help reach out to the younger population, they formed Peer Leaders.

The Peer Leaders organized SPEAK — Sharing Personal Experiences And Knowledge — week, which aims to allow students a channel to talk about difficult subjects and hopes to connect students across social boundaries.

This year, SPEAK week will be March 10-14 and will feature activities from a variety of clubs. Peer Leaders is currently working on the video it will show during the week. The group has determined the students that will be featured in the video and is also compiling still photographs of students to use.

The Watertown Youth Coalition will be holding a general meeting on Feb. 12 at 6 p.m. at the library. The meeting will be open to the public to learn more about the coalition. For any students interested in joining peer leaders, meetings are held every Tuesday after school in the teachers’ cafeteria.

(For more information of Peer Leaders, contact [email protected].)

–Feb. 20, 2014–