Ka Wai Ola - Office of Hawaiian Affairs, Volume 10, Number 11, 1 November 1993 — Ka nūhou mai Alu Like [ARTICLE+ILLUSTRATION]

Ka nūhou mai Alu Like

News from Alu Like

(presented by Ka Wai Ola O OHA and Alu Like as a publie service)

ALU LIKE

Helpina kids stay off drugs

Keoni Kaopua had spent most of his 14 years living among drug abusers. Dope grew easily and quickly in Hāna, and there weren't a lot of people telling him not to smoke the stuff. Like many underprivileged Hawaiians he grew up without mueh faith in either himself, or other Hawaiians, and there didn't seem to be any reason to not piek up habits that his friends shared. Kaopua (not his real name) was referred to Alu Like's Alaka'i Mālama program and things started to change. The program is part of a drug prevention project that uses kūpuna to introduce traditional Hawaiian culture to young Hawaiians and help them find altematives to drugs. For Kaopua it instilled a sense of pride in his past and in himself.

"He went home and said to his father, 'You know Dad, the Hawaiians are really smart people,'" explains Keolani Noa, coordinator for Alu Like's youth drug prevention program in Hāna. "He now has asked to be in the program." Alaka'i Mālama is part of a series of demonstration projects Alu Like has begun to prevent young people at high risk of becoming drug users from starting the destructive habit. Alu Like's High Risk Youth Project, the Youth ATOD (aleo-

hol, tobacco and other drugs) Prevention Project, and the Community Youth ATOD Prevention Project are all part of its social development goal area. They have similar objectives - to reduce the ehanee that young people will start using drugs - but

work on different islands.

For information about Alu Like's ATOD projects contact David Kamiyama in Honolulu at 832-1433.

On O'ahu, the High Risk Youth Project began in January this year and is the first of the demonstration projects. It targets Hawaiian youth whose fathers or mothers

are in jail and are at a high risk of becoming drug-users. "We work with children of offenders and ex-offenders," says Social Development administrator David Kamiyama, "using kāko'o or mentors to provide support on a one-to-one basis." The youth range in age from 12-17 and are referred to the project by schools, family court, or by Alu Like's Offender/Exoffender program (see Ka Wai Ola September 1993 issue). Kāko'o, largely volunteers from the community, are carefully ehosen to match the individuals they are working with, making sure both have similar interests and ean eommunieaīe well. They work with the family to try and

get the child interested in things other than drugs. "The mentors introduce cultural activities or do things like going fishing or shopping," says Kamiyama, adding, "some of these kids have never been to a department store." The Youth ATOD (aleohol, tobacco and other drugs) Project is a similar drug prevention program whieh started up in July of this year for youth in Hāna and Moloka'i. Projects are modified to suit the community so the Maui and Moloka'i projects have some differences. In Maui and Moloka'i, for instance, many of the kids are referred to the project by their parents. Kūpuna, the family, and the entire community all get involved in working with the kids to keep them off drugs. The Maui program offers a three-week summer course where different aspects of traditional Hawaiian culture-net-making, pū sounding, limu cultivation, language and dance-are introduced to the kids by kūpuna. "A lot of the environmental lifestyle still exists here," says coordinator Noa. "We don't need Gameboy." Starting in the next eouple of months the Community Youth ATOD Prevention Project will begin on Kaua'i, Moloka'i, Kona and Lahaina. Unlike the first two projects,

CYAPP is open to the general public with the requirement that a certain percentage of the participants be native Hawaiians. The project will not use one-on-one counseling but insteaq create 14 separate ten-member youth groups (four in West Hawai'i, four in Maui, three in Kaua'i, and three in Moloka'i), eaeh working with two peer kāko'o and an adult advisor. One youth group activity will be to create a strategy to lower substance abuse and change the community attitude in favor of non-use. The group with best idea will win a prize: either a special event or a trip to a neighbor island.

The youth projects are an extension of the Offender/Exoffender and Substance Abu.se projects established earlier by Alu Like that attempted to get adult Hawaiians off drugs and on the job. The Offender/Exoffender project helped former prisoners get back into the workforce. The Substance Abuse project grew out of this because it was discovered that many prisoners were drug users and this affected their ability to both keep work and stay out of prison. The youth projects complete the picture by providing support for young people who are at risk of falling into the same destructive habits as their parerits.