Strategies

Match disadvantaged or at-risk youth with volunteer mentors in school or community settings

Offer programs to help individuals without a high school diploma or its equivalent achieve a high school equivalency credential

Delay school start times for middle and high schools to better align with adolescent sleep-wake cycles; often until after 8:30 or 9:00 a.m.

Support home visits that teach parents about early childhood development and effective parenting strategies, with child development screenings, parental meetings, and links to community resources

Support quality improvement efforts in early child care and preschool via financial incentives, standards, processes to monitor standards and ensure compliance, etc.

Create a school culture of high behavioral and academic expectations, with intense tutoring, increased teacher performance feedback, lengthened instruction time, and health care services

Provide students from public schools, from low income backgrounds, or who have a high risk of dropping out and their families with information about social services and health care supports; also called community resource or family and community liaisons

Implement private sector rules or public sector regulations that prohibit smoking outdoors or restrict it to designated areas

Encourage participants to quit using tobacco by a set date or during a specific time period and give successful participants a chance to win financial rewards or other prizes; often called Quit & Win contests