Oneida Nation students in grade seven through 12 have a unique opportunity to get involved in their community and learn new skills through the Youth Ambassador Program.

“It’s a service learning program,” Suzy Farmer, youth development coordinator, said. “We are focusing on community service and teaching students about youth leadership.”

The group is focusing its attention on the prevention of methamphetamine use and suicide prevention, both of which is prevalent among today’s American Indian population. The group is working on public service announcements and posters, encouraging American Indians to stay strong for themselves, and for their communities.

“We have a lot of meth labs in the area that have been popping up in the news lately. The students have been talking about it, so they’re excited about doing these posters.” Suzy said.

On Tuesdays the group works with Penny Logan (Turtle Clan), prevention specialist, on meth and suicide awareness. The group has learned different skills, such as photography, design, and computer basics. The ambassadors are then pulling their skills together to create the posters.

Suzy stresses the importance of not only the message, but in reaching these youth. “Right now they’re very impressionable and there’s a lot of peer pressure going on. We want to get to this age group mainly because these are the kids (who could be) doing the drugs, the alcohol, and other risky behaviors. We want to keep these kids clean; we want to keep them healthy because they are going to be our leaders.”

Already three students have honed their leadership skills having attended a Native Youth Hope in Action conference in Arizona during the summer. “They created this poster for meth and suicide prevention at a workshop. They presented the poster in front of an entire conference full of tribal leaders and Elders.”

Josie Gibson (Turtle Clan) attended the Arizona workshop. “It was nerve-wracking, but I got through it,” Josie said. “As soon as more people came to ask me about the program, I was getting more professional and telling them more about the program. They actually really got interested and they were going to look us up. They were going to tell their communities (about us) and I was really happy.”

“It was very incredible,” Suzy added. “We were very proud of them. A lot of people came up to them and were hugging them, and they were very inspired by our students.”