North Kingstowns Health and Wellness Subcommittee heard on Dec. 9 from the North Kingstown Prevention Coalition about local efforts to prevent youth vaping and substance misuse, including a hands-on demonstration kit and a proposed student poster contest.

Coalition leader Kayla Van Gordon told the committee the coalition is grant-funded through the Department of Behavioral Health and focuses on outreach that can be reported to funders. She described a physical demonstration kit that shows common chemicals found in vapes, saying, "It is surprisingly expensive to get one of these," and listing examples including "acetone, benzene ... formaldehyde" and nicotine as materials used in the kit. Van Gordon said South County Prevention currently owns the kit and can rent it to schools, but North Kingstown does not yet have funding to purchase its own kit.

Van Gordon outlined classroom and after-school programming the coalition offers. Prevention Plus Wellness are single 45-minute, evidence-based motivational interventions that target substance misuse and promote healthy lifestyles; the coalition is focusing this program on grades 6 through 8. She also described Media Detective, an activity-based media-literacy curriculum for grades 3 through 5, and a 15-minute "sideline" opioid-safety presentation previously used at high-school sports nights that this year reached about 1,400 students via athlete packets.

Committee members discussed how lessons should be scheduled and who should deliver them. Van Gordon said student assistance counselors coordinate with teachers and that she will re-contact counselors and PE teachers to align the hands-on kit with health lessons. Members favored piloting the poster/sign contest at the middle-school level so it can be integrated with existing health lessons and student-assistance-counselor activities; one member suggested that middle-school winners could be announced at an assembly and displayed in a permanent frame or laminated holder.

On enforcement and retail compliance, Van Gordon said flavored vapes are currently illegal to sell but that sellers sometimes hide those products; she said efforts to encourage compliance include retailer outreach and joint compliance checks with the police department and sticker-shock campaigns at local vendors.

Van Gordon identified practical barriers to parent participation in programming, including childcare and transportation, and described district supports (the office of family learning and event buses for Title I schools) she said could reduce those obstacles. The coalition will provide a list of items in the hands-on kit, PDFs of the signage, and contact information to the committee for follow-up.

Votes at a glance: The subcommittee moved to approve the minutes from Oct. 2, 2025; a motion was made, seconded and verbal assent recorded. The committee later moved to adjourn; that motion was seconded and verbal assent recorded. The minutes and adjournment were approved by voice vote (tally not specified in the meeting record).

Next steps: Van Gordon said she would email the item list and signage PDFs and reach out to student assistance counselors; the subcommittee scheduled its next meeting for Jan. 14, 2026.