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The Youth Connections Coalition based in Helena, Montana, is a coalition of over 1,100 community members who work to make Helena a healthy and supportive place for kids and families. For roughly ten years, the coalition has shared community-specific resources and information for parents in the form of a quarterly publication titled, YC Magazine.<\/em><\/p>\n \u201cMost coalitions really struggle, number one, to brand themselves, and number two, to let the community know what they\u2019re doing and to highlight their work, and to get educational information to parents in a form that they\u2019ll read. We feel like we\u2019ve nailed it with this one piece,\u201d said Coleen Smith, Executive Director of Youth Connections<\/strong>.<\/p>\n \u201cWe come out with issues quarterly and we try to stick with a theme, like we\u2019ll do a back-to-school issue in September. For March, we\u2019ll usually feature articles on how to support parents to help kids power through to finish the school year strong, and our summer issue focuses on issues that parents deal with during break like curfews, cellphone use, keeping them motivated and keeping them reading. We know that drug and alcohol-use increases in the summer, so we touch on that as well. We also have a one-page article that we always use to focus on a specific substance.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cI work with the magazine committee which is comprised of two counselors, a teacher and a parent, and we all brainstorm who would be the best to write which article. I\u2019ve got a psychiatrist who often lets me reprint articles featured on his blog that I think are especially helpful. I\u2019m always reaching out to the counselors about what they\u2019re seeing and if there is anything new. Our September issue that\u2019s going to come out in a couple of weeks has an article on Xanax, because our counselor is saying he is seeing an increase in youth use of that substance.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cWith the new legalization of marijuana \u2013 we\u2019re in Montana, so it just got legalized for adult use here \u2013 we\u2019ve also been focusing a lot on marijuana, edibles and vapes. We just did an article on Delta-8. We try to be really timely and focused on the stuff that parents are dealing with right now, and then substances that are coming up.\u201d<\/p>\n Another section of the magazine is known as \u201cFaces in the Crowd\u201d, where an outstanding elementary, middle and high school student, as well as one adult and community partner, are recognized for doing good in their community.<\/p>\n \u201cWe have a professional photographer that takes a picture for our cover and a marketing company that does the layout, so it looks very professional. We\u2019ve got nine and a half pages of advertising space that can be used either for information (PSAs or activities going on in the community), or the advertising space can be sold as a fundraiser, or there can be a combination of the two.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cWe print 7,000 copies and mail them to the parents in the school district, and then we also place them in various locations around town, like doctor\u2019s offices, dentist offices, libraries and the YMCA. Our school district didn\u2019t allow us to send stuff home, so we had to mail everything. We get the mailing list from the school with no names, so it just goes to a parent of the Helena School District.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cThe feedback has been really positive. Everything is geared towards parents, so it\u2019s something they find super helpful. I just hear, \u2018Gosh, that\u2019s something we were just dealing with, I\u2019m so glad that article is in there.\u2019 It is also great for the advertisers, too, because we don\u2019t charge that much, and if you\u2019re trying to target parents, it\u2019s something that they are looking at and gets delivered right to their doorstep.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cMy board put together a policy of who we will accept as advertisers, so no alcohol, drugs, tattoos, abortion or anything controversial is allowed to be advertised in the magazine. In fact, even if a restaurant has an ad that includes alcohol in it, we won\u2019t accept that into the magazine.\u201d<\/p>\n In the past, Youth Connections has exhibited at CADCA events, such as the Mid-Year Training Institute and National Leadership Forum, to share information about how coalitions can work with Youth Connections to implement this into their own community.<\/p>\n \u201cThis is a way to brand the coalition, get information out to parents in a form that they will actually look at and read, and then it\u2019s also a revenue generator and sustainability plan. So, it\u2019s great for new coalitions as they are trying to brand their coalition and put it out there about who they are and what they are trying to do.\u201d<\/p>\n