At the recent annual meeting of the North Carolina chapter of the Society for Public Health Education held at East Carolina University, the Orange County Youth Tobacco-Use Prevention Program received the Kathy Kerr Outstanding Health Education Project Award. This award recognizes public health programs that have successfully implemented outstanding projects in health education.
Pam Diggs, program coordinator, accepted the award at the society’s awards banquet.
According to school data, teen smoking rates have decreased steadily in the Chapel Hill-Carrboro City Schools District, from 20 percent in 2001 to 12 percent in 2007. The percentage of youth who have never smoked increased from 63.2 percent in 2001 to 72 percent in 2007. Similarly, the number of students in the Orange County Schools District who have never smoked increased steadily from 54 percent in 2001 to 74 percent in 2006.