February 12, 2008....FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Contact Person: Andi Hannah, RN
Company Name: Clark County Tobacco Prevention and Cessation Coalition
Voice Phone Number: 812-283-2649
FAX Number: 812-283-2411
Email Address: andrea.hannah@clarkmemorial.org
West Clark Community Schools to Receive Gary Sandifur Tobacco-Free School Award
Indiana Tobacco Prevention & Cessation and Clark County Tobacco Prevention and Cessation Coalition Honor West Clark Community Schools for Comprehensive Tobacco-Free Policy
Sellersburg, IN - West Clark Community Schools will be honored with the Gary Sandifur Tobacco-Free School Campus Award on February 14, at their scheduled school board meeting in the Administration Office in Sellersburg. The award from Indiana Tobacco Prevention and Cessation and Clark County Tobacco Prevention and Cessation Coalition is the result of a campus policy making school grounds totally tobacco-free.
The Gary Sandifur Award, honoring a Kokomo, Indiana, man who was a life-long smoker and died at age fifty, is awarded exclusively to schools that enact comprehensive tobacco-control policies, prohibiting tobacco use by students, school staff, parents and visitors on school property and in school vehicles. The policy must be enforced on school days and weekends, and it must encompass all events held on school property.
"As a student from Silver Creek High School, I am honored to represent the students who have chosen a tobacco-free lifestyle. I am proud that West Clark is taking this stand to make our school district tobacco-free," states Andrew Clayton, who was selected for the Indiana High School Athletic Association (IHSAA) role model program.
Lorene Sandifur, who was featured in a well-known series of statewide television advertisements telling the story of losing her husband, guided the creation of the award in order to continue delivering Gary's message on smoking and what it did to shorten his life. Gary Sandifur died of lung cancer due to smoking that had spread to his brain.
"I don't want other wives or husbands, sons and daughters to feel the pain I felt when I lost Gary," said Lorene Sandifur. "I hope to encourage people to never start smoking and those who are addicted, I encourage them to quit today."
By honoring schools with an award in his name, Lorene hopes to spread his message to our most vulnerable population for tobacco initiation - youth. An estimated 19,600 Hoosier children under age 18 become daily smokers each year, and in 2003, 23 percent of Indiana's high school students reported using tobacco.
Through comprehensive tobacco-free school campus policies, students cannot smoke on school grounds or in their cars, and more importantly, parents and teachers cannot smoke in front of impressionable youth on school grounds, setting a clear example and giving a consistent message that tobacco use is a life-threatening addiction.
Clark County Tobacco Prevention and Cessation Coalition is comprised of a variety of individuals, business and community organizations that are dedicated to reducing tobacco dependency, exposure to secondhand smoke, and youth initiation of smoking. They are funded by Master Settlement Agreement monies granted by Indiana Tobacco Prevention and Cessation (ITPC), Indiana's agency charged by statute with management of the state's tobacco control programs. For more information in Clark County, call 812-283-2649; in Floyd County, call 812-923-3400. To contact ITPC, call 317- 234-1787 or visit www.whitelies.tv or its youth movement at www.voice.tv.
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