Smoke Less
Smoke Less America is a nonprofit organization committed to
the reduction of tobacco use in the
Education
Smoke Less America is dedicated to reducing tobacco use
through education. By informing the
public and emphasizing the dangers of smoking, the negative health consequence
of tobacco use can be prevented before it occurs. In order to accomplish
this goal Smoke Less America concentrates on providing the public with
information regarding the inherent dangers associated with smoking cigarettes.
By educating the public about the physiological, psychological and ecological
danger that smoking posses to both the smoker and those around him or her,
current smokers are motivated to quit using tobacco and non-smokers are
encouraged to never begin tobacco use.
In order to accomplish the goal of tobacco use danger education, Smoke
Less America performs the following functions:
Education
via the internet
The internet is an invaluable tool for
the quick, inexpensive and efficient distribution of educational
information. As is frequently cited in
the popular media, the information super-highway is the fastest growing
information delivery service in the world today. Smoke Less America is in an
ideal situation to make use of the World Wide Web to promote their goal of
educating the population regarding the perils of smoking. Currently Smoke Less America has developed
and maintains two web sites that provide continually updated information regarding
smoking cessation, summaries of the latest research on the dangers of tobacco
use, recommendations and tips for quitting smoking and links to other resources
on the web.
Education via the
classroom
One
of Smoke Less America’s primary goals is to encourage the youth of today
from ever starting to use tobacco products.
By providing educational material to local schools that encourage a
tobacco-free lifestyle, Smoke Less America hopes to give children and
adolescents both the information they need to make an educated choice not to
smoke, as well as the motivation to
resist both the overt and subtle pressures on them to begin smoking. To that end, Smoke Less America provides
educational and inspirational information to local elementary, middle schools,
high schools and universities free of charge across a wide range of modalities that
is congruent with the educational level of the target audience.
Education
via interpersonal interaction
Smoke
Less America is dedicated to the education of adults regarding the dangers of
tobacco use. Through a vigorous outreach
program, Smoke Less America provides smoking educational information and
material to adults across a variety of settings including health fairs,
exercise centers, hospitals and work environments. By diversifying the methods used to
disseminate information on tobacco use, Smoke Less America widens its audience
and expands on the number of people it can aid in preventing from starting
smoking.
Prevention
Although direct education about the dangers and hazards
of tobacco use is an excellent deterrent to beginning smoking, Smoke Less
America emphasizes the prevention of smoking through alternative strategies
that have been proven to beneficial in deterring ever starting a smoking habit.
Specifically, Smoke Less America promotes lifestyles that are inherently
incompatible with a cigarette smoking.
Prevention through
Fitness
Smoke
Less America has designed and provides a fitness program geared to encouraging
an active life style that is incompatible with smoking. Over the past 10 years Smoke Less America has
provided fitness programs on site for aerobic classes, yoga classes,
basketball, baseball, softball, soccer, weight lifting and other physical
activities to local communities.
Prevention through
Activity
Smoke
Less America sponsors and provides for a variety of activities in a smoke free
environment. For example, a wide
selection of recreational and educational projects are hosted at Smoke Less
America’s offices including billiard games, darts, book sales, theme-focused
group meetings and social clubs.
Prevention through
Recreation
Another
aspect of Smoke Less America's goal of prevention is through supporting youth
park activities. Specifically, Smoke
Less America encourages a tobacco free lifestyle by sponsoring local sport
teams and providing equipment and field space. Smoke Less America contributes
to both individual and team sport organizations in order to support young
people in activities that are incompatible with smoking.
Rehabilitation
Smoke Less America is committed to providing aid and
support to individuals, groups and organizations interested in smoking
cessation. Quitting smoking can be a
difficult and daunting task for the lone individual. Smoke Less America provides support through a
variety of methods in order to accommodate as many people as possible in their
quest to become smoke free.
Rehabilitation for the
Individual
Research supports that far and away most smokers try to
quit on their own and that most successful ex-smokers did so without the aid of
a formalized interactive intervention.
In order to provide support to a population that prefers to quit without
attending smoking cessation interventions, Smoke Less America has designed
multiple comprehensive self-help smoking cessation programs that it provides
nation-wide free of charge. The program
covers a wide variety of topics involved with quitting smoking and includes
both a written program as well as auditory material.
Rehabilitation for the
Group
Smoke Less America provides smoking cessation workshops
to the public on an on-going basis. The
programs developed by Smoke Less America range from brief, motivation and
education focused single session interventions to more comprehensive, multi-session
programs that lead smokers through the process of quitting by providing
information and instruction before quitting, motivation and support during the
quitting process and reinforcement after a smoke free life style has been
achieved.
Rehabilitation for the
Organization
More and more organizations are creating smoke-free work
environments and often wish to provide smoking cessation support to their
staff. Smoke Less America offers smoking
cessation workshops specifically designed for delivery of smoking cessation
information with a work place setting.
While less comprehensive than the group treatment programs described
above, the organization based programs are focused on maximizing effective
smoking cessation techniques within the limited time frame frequently
associated with work-place based smoking cessation programs.