Botvin Life Skills essay contest winners

Throughout the 2023-2024 school year, the 11th Judicial staff presented life skills information to 6th, 7th and 8th graders. 

The 6th grade students ended their semester with their teacher, Mr. Firme, ensuring the students submitted an essay based on some of the content they had learned.

It was decided to make it an essay contest. 

Botvin is an evidence-based substance abuse prevention program proven to reduce the risks of alcohol, tobacco, drug abuse, and violence by targeting the major social and psychological factors that promote the initiation of substance use and other risky behaviors. Program learning objectives include: 

• Personal Self-Management Skills - Students develop skills that help them enhance self-esteem, develop problem-solving abilities, reduce stress and anxiety, and manage anger. 

• General Social Skills - Students gain skills to meet personal challenges, such as overcoming shyness, communicating, building relationships, and avoiding violence. 

• Drug Resistance Skills - Students build effective defenses against pressures to use tobacco, alcohol, and other drugs. 

6TH GRADE 

WINNERS 

First Place: Aylin Martinez (her outstanding essay is highlighted below).

Second Place: Emma Shanahan

Third Place: Olivia Shanahan

Fourth Place: Natalia Tapia

Fifth Place: Heath Meckley

FIRST PLACE ESSAY CONTEST WINNER

By Aylin Martinez

Life Decisions

This might be the most important thing you will ever read because it could help you avoid making bad decisions and keep you alive. 

These are some things about alcohol. Alcohol is a drug contained in beverages (drinks) such as beer, wine coolers, and liquor.

Alcohol, only a small amount can slow down the ability to think clearly and can cause people to make poor decisions. It can also cause people to feel more daring than usual and take risks. 

In summary, if drinking alcohol, be careful and realize you are taking a risk. 

These are some reasons you shouldn’t vape/smoke. One bad effect, it affects your eyes and ultimately your vision. It can cause the eyes to become red and lead to loss of eyesight. The second bad effect is that it causes the temperature of the skin to drop. 

The third reason is it makes it harder to breathe normally, which makes it harder to do well in sports and other activities. In summary, these are just some reasons why you shouldn’t smoke cigarettes or vapes. 

I want to tell you about anxiety because I struggle with anxiety, and I want to tell you the symptoms and how you can help it.

You can feel the butterflies in your stomach, you can get a rapid heart rate, and can get a shaky voice. You can feel stressed, nervous, or uneasy. 

Ways to help with anxiety are deep breaths, muscle relaxation, and mental rehearsal. 

In summary, if you do struggle with anxiety, or think you have anxiety, these are some things that could help. 

Anger is normal and healthy. People can think it is unhealthy, but it's not, it is healthy and normal. What can be unhealthy is when you don't cope or handle it correctly. 

One way to control it is by making self-statements. Like saying “I can handle this” or “I can stay calm”. Another way to handle it is by reframing. 

This means thinking, “Is this worth getting angry about?” or “Is this person out to hurt or insult me”. In summary, if you ever think about getting angry, think about these things before trying to get angry. 

I would be talking about self-image. The meaning of self-image is simply how we see ourselves. It is important for two reasons: It affects how we behave, what we do, and how well we do it. 

The second reason is how good you see yourself, people who feel good about themselves feel confident, satisfied, more successful, and do better in school. In summary, this is how self-image can affect you. 

Now you know how these things can affect you if you use them, you learned about alcohol, vaping/smoking, anxiety, anger, and self-image. 

I hope you learned something to help you not do any of these things.