In case you missed it, the Friday Night Live club at AGHS hosted a panel in the campus MPR with small activities about mental health, drug use and abuse, and relationship health for students to interact with and learn from. Also included was information on body image issues and coping strategies for people with anxiety or depression.

The FNL club is a program that has roots in the entire county, with each school having its own chapter (management body of students from either middle school or high school).

The organization is facilitated by Mr. Sligh, the club advisor, and the county coordinator Megan Frauenheim. The AGHS FNL club has done letter drives for people in senior homes, beach cleanups, and staffed the Vitalant blood drive which AGHS hosts two times a year. 

Wednesday last week, health education specialist Janelle Merzon from the SLO county Tobacco Control Program presented two pig lungs dyed and altered to be representative of human lungs after years of smoking and vaping. With a foot pump beneath the table, you could inflate the pig lungs and watch them expand. Some parts of the lungs were simulated to fail to expand to represent the effect of a buildup of tar in the lungs.

On their presentation table, they had flyers with information and programs for aiding people in quitting vaping.

On the other side of the panel, there were some statistics relating to AGHS students’ participation in vaping.

Just over 20 percent of AGHS 9th-11th graders began vaping before the age of 14. 

69 percent of AGHS 9th-11th graders haven’t used a vaping device.

72 percent of AGHS 9th-11th graders think vaping several times a day is extremely harmful.

Source: California Healthy Kids Survey 2020

Those statistics were from 2 years ago, and due to the change we have seen around campus targeting drug use and tardiness regarding student bathroom and cellphone usage, drug abuse at AGHS among youth could be more severe today. 

For students struggling with vaping or other drug use, there was a panel present informing students of a long list of different apps to help students to combat addiction. Headspace, 7 Cups, SAM, MY3, Couch to 5K, Super Better, Daylio, and I Am Sober are all great tools you can access easily to turn your phone into a self-help tool.

Here are some other highlights from the panel.