Duration: 2018 – 2020
Principal Researcher
Amador Calafat
Team Members
Cátia Magalhães
Funding
Erasmus +
Research line:
Education, Citizenship and Inclusion
The EPOPS project involved three countries - Portugal, Spain and Germany (and different entities in each country). Adolescent drugs use is on the centre of many structural problems that EU policy is working to eradicate. However, major prevention practice in Europe continues to be dominated by activities that appeal to cognitive persuasive processes (EMCDDA, 2015). Change is needed to expand the scope of community programmes, engaging new target groups, promoting evidence based interventions and environmental policies mostly targeting underage drinking and drug use.
The aim of this project is to adapt and evaluate a pilot implementation of the FERYA programme in two European countries. FERYA is designed to empower parents’ organizations to prevent risks related to substance use that affect their children. The programme has had a trial implementation in three Spanish regions during the last three years with very promising results in terms of parents’ implication to undertake preventive actions at local level.
The elaboration of a prevention programme with a contextual approach including an evaluation model to examine empowerment of the organizations, assessment of their readiness to change, and strengthening their foundations to actively engage them in prevention will represent an important advance in the field of community-oriented capacity building for substance abuse prevention.
Trained parents, as proactive agents, will act like seeds expanding prevention and having an impact at three levels:
i) family, integrating parental styles knowledge to ameliorate family performance;
ii) community, by engaging other parents, promoting in-school evidence-based programmes for students and families, and sensitizing and engaging the broader community in project objectives and aims;
iii) social and political level, introducing environmental changes oriented to alcohol and drug prevention.