Youth Eastside Services (YES) in partnership with Juanita High School is offering a free drug awareness and prevention presentation titled “Understanding Adolescent Substance Abuse.”

The program will be held at 7 p.m. Wednesday, April 24 in the library at Juanita High School.

The presentation will cover substances commonly abused, signs and symptoms of drug use, risk factors, setting healthy boundaries, and more.

“The best way to keep your child safe is to become an informed advocate,” says Tena Youngberg, CDP, NCAC, the program presenter and a YES substance abuse counselor who works with teens at Juanita High School two days a week as an intervention specialist.

The class came about in part as a way to respond to parent wishes to be better informed about teen drug and alcohol use and current trends. These were expressed in a recent survey distributed by Juanita High PTSA.

According to the recently released Healthy Youth Survey conducted in schools across the state, while alcohol use is down among teens, marijuana use has increased. In fact, more kids see dangers in alcohol use or second-hand smoke than marijuana.

However, the marijuana today is much stronger — at least eight times stronger than the “weed” of the sixties. In addition, counselors at YES report seeing more kids who are experimenting with heroin. Youngberg will be reviewing ways parents can tell if their child is using drugs and how to respond.

“Alcohol and other drugs are more detrimental to an adolescent’s developing body than at any other time in their life,” explains Youngberg. “Substance use can seriously interrupt development of a healthy brain and lead to other significant problems,” she adds. Youngberg, a certified chemical dependency professional, has worked with kids providing clinical counseling and substance abuse treatment for over 20 years.

YES is a leading nonprofit provider of youth substance abuse and mental health counseling services. They have a number of experts on the front lines working with youth and families in schools, teen centers and at locations in Bellevue, Redmond, Sammamish and Kirkland.

For more information, visit www.YouthEastsideServices.org.