Luther Burbank Health Fair

Recently, we attended a health fair titled Healthy-wood at Luther Burbank High School in South Sacramento. There were about 100 students who attended the health fair and they all came over to talk to us about tobacco control. About 15 of the youths who participated in our Midwest Academy Strategy meeting on 12/4/10 were at the health fair and we were glad to see them again.

Midwest Academy Strategy Conference

On 12/4/2010, ACT-UP along with Project SOL put together a Midwest Academy Strategy Conference at Strikes Bowling Alley in Elk Grove. We are extremely delighted that many youths participated and attended the meeting. We had a great and productive meeting and the youths made new friends whom they'll hopefully be working with again in the future with us. These are some pictures from the event.

Postcard Contest Winner!

We'd like to announce the winner for the ACT-UP 2010 Postcard Contest! Congratulation to Ricardo Meza from Hiram Johnson High School for winning the prize! Thanks for all the help and encouragements from Mr. Diaz from HJHS for helping us reach out to the students about this opportunity. Also, thanks to all the participants who have turned in their entries.

11/18/10 Great American Smoke-Out

11/18/10 was the National Great American Smoke-Out. ACT-UP partnered with Dr. Elisa Tong at UCDMC to celebrate this day as the nation takes up the effort to quit smoking for 24 hours. We came out to UCDMC and talked to many staff members and patients who have smoked in the past or they are trying to quit. We hope that the people whom we have talked to will utilize the information that were given to them and things will come to a fruitful ending.

Midwest Academy Strategy Conference

On 11/16/10, ACT-UP along with the SOL Project and community members met up for a conference concerning secondhand smoke in outdoor non-recreational areas such as sidewalks, plazas, college campuses, farmers' markets, and outdoor dinning areas. ACT-UP and the SOL Project presented our goals and objectives and along with the community  members we were able to brainstorm and came up with many useful strategies to benefit our projects even more.

Sac Cultural Hub-Exceptional Women of Color

Sac Chinese Community Service Center was a sponsor of the 3rd annual Exceptional Women of Color Conference in Sacramento. There were a lot of beautiful and smart women who attended the conference which provided a lot of networking opportunity with other people and agencies. There were informative workshops for us as well as community services booths. ACT-UP was one of the attendees that was there to educate the public about anti-tobacco and secondhand smoke.

Red Ribbon Week

In the last week of October, we celebrated Red Ribbon Week as a commemoration of Officer Enrique Camanera who had given up his life while fighting against the drug lords in Mexico. Officer Camanera had been a part of the Drug Enforcement Agency and he was sent as an undercover agent to Mexico where his efforts led to a successful operation of discovering a multi-million dollar drug manufacturing facility. However, the drug lords were not happy about this and they sought revenge which led to the brutal murder of Officer Camanera and his partner. Since 1985, we've been celebrating Red Ribbon Week to honor Officer Camanera as well as the other men and women who have fought and given their lives to keep drugs and alcohol off our streets and communities. As a part of this effort, ACT-UP came to different schools within the Sacramento County Unified School District and gave mini-presentations to students ranging K-12.