Kaylee Davis

Writer

Continuing their annual training season through Marlow, the Youth Action for Health Leadership program (YAHL) is an Oklahoma exclusive program that works to educate students and influence major companies on health.

Family and Consumer Science (FACS) teacher Tamra may has hosted the YAHL training at Marlow for two years, having welcomed the program at its founding in 2021.

“We just got started during the second semester last year so it feels like we are just getting started,” May said. “We already have 23 committed students.”

The training took place on Thursday, Sept. 22 and consisted of icebreakers, education over the goals mission, teaching students how they can get involved in the process and collecting surveys for both the Elevate and Counteract Tobacco program.

Participating students split into groups of up to five people, working together to get a minimum of eight surveys per member of the group.

One of these students in attendance was sophomore Macie Lucas.

“The training has shown me to share the positive experience and spread awareness about tobacco,” Lucas said.

The program’s two biggest missions are the Elevate Student Health program and Counteract Tobacco program.

Alex Handfinger has been the senior account manager of YAHL for 18 months, holding a total of 40 training sessions a year.

“YAHL is a program of the Tobacco Settlement Endowment Trust (TSET) partners with schools and organizations to make a meaningful and measurable impact on Oklahoma by promoting healthy behaviors,” Handfinger stated.

The goal of Elevate is to educate school principals and vice-principals on how those involved with the school feel about health options offered at school events and the regular school day.

Counteract tobacco has similar goals of health, their program, however, is open to a wider range of people.

Rather than focusing on a single school, Counteract Tobacco takes surveys from teenagers and adults all across Oklahoma, taking their results to state legislators.

The goals of this program consist of working to change marketing tactics and the retail licensing laws of E-cigarettes.

The YAHL program will continue with its influence as the program continues to spread and grow.