2
The Alternative Community Events (ACE) Framework supports a diverse array of activities and services that promote positive norms, messaging, skill development, and community connection. It is designed to enhance mental health, raise awareness, combat stigma, foster positive youth development, and advance community health and well-being, including substance use prevention. The framework encompasses events that engage families, youth, and priority populations, providing safe, constructive alternatives that strengthen community bonds and support overall wellness; a few examples of ACEs include substance-free events, organized recreational trips, dances and parties, leadership activities, integration with services at community drop-in centers, and community service activities.
Stakeholder Involvement:
Engaging a diverse group of stakeholders—including the priority population, youth, parents, schools, community organizations, and local businesses—in the planning process will ensure that events are appealing and relevant to the priority audience. Their input will be invaluable in shaping the events to meet community needs.
Advance Notification: The priority audience should be informed about the events well in advance so that they can plan and look forward to attending.
Establishing Synergies:
To fully understand the capability of ACEs impacts, it is important to look beyond standard risk and protective factors commonly used in prevention efforts and factor in the role of ecology, interaction, and relational considerations. The Social Development Model highlights the pathway by which adolescents shape their decisions and behavior patterns through bonding achieved by repeated involvement with and perceived reinforcements from family, school, peers, and the community, coupled with healthy beliefs and clear standards. Further, the Alternative Community Events Framework is designed with sufficient comprehensiveness to enable communities to implement multiple Center for Substance Abuse Prevention (CSAP) Core Strategies. When intentionally incorporated into local design, this framework can extend beyond simply providing Alternatives. It has the potential to impact Community-Based Processes, Prevention Education, Information Dissemination, and Environmental strategies. By thoughtfully integrating these elements, communities can leverage the ACE Framework to address multiple facets of health promotion and prevention simultaneously.
Evidence-Informed Components:
When implementation design at the local level is grounded in the Social Development Strategy (Catalano, Hawkins, Berglund, Pollard, & Arthur, 2002), ACEs are strengthened as being evidence-informed, categorically. However, local ACE design must include certain components to be designated as such, in terms of implementation. These include adherence to fidelity requirements and evaluation. Although local organizations may sponsor or adopt events to support ongoing efforts, the following process and desig