A popsicle can be tasty unless there is a cigarette butt lurking inside.
And in the same way, smoking may seem appealing, but lasting side effects are waiting.
This is just one of the prevention messages that awaited middle school students from all over the region at the 13th annual Teen Maze at the county fairgrounds on Thursday and Friday.
This year’s focus was on how decisions – positive and negative – impact brain development.
“The maze is designed to be informative, nonjudgmental, and interactive,” said Peggy Tennyson, the director of the School Community Youth Collaborative that organizes the event.
Middle School students chose randomized life scenarios impacted by negative behaviors like smoking, drinking and having unprotected sex. Students had the option to take two tracks through maze, one that highlighted drugs and jail, and the other that focused on sexual health and pregnancy.
Positive options were presented along the way, and Judy Ha, of the Youth Leadership Council, said the intent is to create the expectation that participants make good decisions.
Students from the local council organized the tobacco-prevention room and designed ways for the students to experience the effects of tobacco. Their room within the maze featured the “buttsicles,” created by freezing cigarette butts in water. They also demonstrated how smoking reduces all five senses. For example, they provided students with scentless flowers and gun that became flavorless.
The expectation is not that the maze will turn around negative trends, such as the teen birth rate in Montezuma County. (It was 52 per 1,000 in 2012.) It’s that it will be part of a comprehensive approach.
Prevention needs to include guidance from parents, schools, messages in the media as well the maze, said Rebecca Larson the board president of the School Community Youth Collaborative.
“All those different messages combine to make a strong comprehensive strategy,” Larson said. The event brought together 150 volunteers from the 22 local organizations.
Students were scheduled to come from Cortez, Silverton, Mancos, Dolores, Dove Creek and Nucla.
mshinn@cortezjournal.com