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More info drug survey
I just read Dawn Beigel’s article on drug use by young people in Oakwood in the Jan. 15 edition of your paper. The city of Oakwood and its school district are to be commended for taking a hard look at a one of the most serious problems confronting its young people. Much of the data cited in the story came from the Dayton Area Drug Survey (DADS). Please be aware of the fact that DADS is a project of the Center for Interventions, Treatment & Addictions Research at Wright State University’s Boonshoft School of Medicine, where it was developed in 1990. Since then it has been administered by WSU in conjunction with Unified Health Solutions, a United Way agency, and area schools. DADS is used by schools across the Dayton area, not just Oakwood and the south suburbs. For more information on DADS, please visit its website: http: //www.med.wright.edu/citar/dads/
Russel Falck, MA
Associate Director, CITAR
Department of Community Health
Boonshoft School of Medicine
Wright State University
Commentary on 5th annual MLK Jr. Breakfast
This year marks the 5th anniversary of our Kettering-Oakwood Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. Breakfast celebration. Such a benchmark gives reason to pause and consider the original intent when then Mayor Marilou Smith and I set forth to create this event. Our initiating purpose was to increase community recognition of the King Holiday, encourage involvement in the downtown march and rally, and to open dialogue regarding race relations in our region. Those purposes remain today but are more comprehensively expressed in the desire to recognize the life and vision of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., and to carry forth his work as a means of encouraging an awakening moral conscience of our residents; spreading a vision of a cooperative, unifying society which embraces diversity; and inspiring individual action by encouraging citizens to make a difference where they are.
We are all keenly aware that spending a couple hours together once a year has limited power to accomplish such important goals. However, we can use our celebration in many ways:
Let this time of celebrating the message and mission of Dr. King renew our resolve to work for inclusive communities;
Consider the times in which Dr. King lived, and let the progress we have made since then inspire us to move forward;
Remind ourselves that we are all subject to the harm perpetrated by racism and prejudice and that these threats are legion.
Vow to remember that people are not categories but individuals, and strive to know them, not label them.
I invite citizens to volunteer their time and energy to future Breakfast celebrations. Participation in this joint project with the city of Kettering brings personal benefit as well as contributing to the success of our mission.
Judy Cook
Mayor of Oakwood
January 29, 2008
Volume 17, No. 5
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