The
phrase jumped out at
Pam
Smallwood
from a publication on teen pregnancy
in the 1980s. It showed a young
woman taking charge of her
relationships and saying, “I
ain’t going to be nobody’s
fool.”
Smallwood,
then education director of Planned
Parenthood of Central Texas, tagged
that name — Nobody’s Fool — to
a half-day conference on puberty,
dating and relationship issues.
Now,
13 years later, Nobody’s Fool has
served more than 5,000 young people
and won national awards. The name is
copyrighted. There is a training
manual and a training event each
year in conjunction with the
conference, scheduled this year for
July 24.
“All
of this has local origins,” said
Smallwood, who now serves as CEO of
the agency. “It truly is our
baby.”
The
initial conference, an event open
only to girls, was in 1989.
“We
thought maybe 20 girls would come to
this thing, and 100 showed up,”
she said. “It was very successful,
and it was obvious they were hungry
for information.”
The
only complaints were that boys and
younger children weren’t in
cl
uded.
“We had parents saying, ‘My
fifth grader needs this
information,’” Smallwood said.
In
1990, which marked the first true
year of Nobody’s Fool as it is
today, organizers hoped for a couple
hundred kids. They got between 500
and 600, and attendance has remained
strong. The event is for youth
entering grades five through nine.
“Our
goal has always been to try to reach
kids before they start dating,”
Smallwood said. Although younger
kids already may be dating, the
serious romantic relationships tend
to be later in high school, she
said.
With
lessons on everything from sexually
transmitted diseases to the
hallmarks of healthy and unhealthy
relationships, the half-day
conference is meant to open a
conversation that ideally the
youngsters will continue at home.
“We
hope that they walk away with a
sense that relationships and
sexuality is a topic that’s
important, that’s talkable,”
said Pat Stone, Planned Parenthood's
education director. “For some
kids, that’s real supportive of
what’s at home. For some kids,
that’s a breath of fresh air.”
Sessions
are split by age and gender, with
approaches geared to students' grade
levels.
“Fifth-grade
girls are real curious about their
bodies and what’s happening to
them,” Stone said.
While
personal safety information for
older girls may focus on date rape,
sessions for younger girls will
emphasize appropriate and
inappropriate touch.
“Sometimes
they think the bad guys are going to
carry guns and be really creepy,”
Stone said. Conference teachers will
stress that inappropriate behavior
can come even from a seemingly nice
adult.
Ninth-grade
girls, on the other hand, want to
talk about healthy relationships,
she said. So they cover behaviors to
watch out for in dating, such as the
boyfriend who insists his girlfriend
carry a beeper everywhere so he can
reach her at all times.
“If
they don’t hear that as a
potential red flag, they may think,
‘Cute, he wants to keep up with
me,’ ” Stone said. “What we
hope to do is give them some
guidelines of what does make a
healthy relationship and give them
some red flags.”
Classes
also are split by gender, which
Smallwood says is mostly a matter of
convenience.
“We
believe boys and girls need to hear
each other on this,” she said.
“We have to split the kids up
somehow and that’s just an easy
way to do this.”
The
content is updated every year, but
the topics remain the same. “We
try to make every
cl
assroom more interactive every year,” Stone said. “We can present
some pretty serious issues, but if
we can do it in an interactive, fun
method, the kids react to it. They
remember it.”
Each
room has a question box in which
students can submit any question
they have. Those are answered later
in the session.
What
participants learn at the conference
is not all they need to know. Stone
stresses that in three hours, the
conversation about sexuality has
just begun. Each participant will
receive a packet of resources that
Stone says can provide a framework
for further conversations at home.
Many
participants return year after year,
and new material is presented at
each grade level.
"It’s
fun," Stone said. "It
really does have a fun
atmosphere.”
Many
of the 100 volunteers needed to put
on the conference come year after
year, as well. Two teachers who are
trained health educators take a lead
role in each
cl
assroom, and then volunteers fill in the gaps.
Smallwood
said the support of local agencies
and businesses also has played an
important role in the success of
Nobody's Fool over the years.
“I
think that adds to its success. When
parents look at the brochure and
they see 'X’ number of local
businesses are donating money,
agencies (are involved) — that
lends a lot of credibility to a
subject a lot of parents find very
uncomfortable,” she said.
NOBODY'S
FOOL
WHEN:
8:30
a.m. to 12:30 p.m.
July 24
WHERE:
Waco
Convention
Center
ADMISSION:
Registration costs $5.
Transportation is available, as are
a limited number of scholarships.
Preregistration is suggested.
FOR
MORE INFORMATION: Call 759-5777,
Ext. 230.
Reproduced
with permission of
Waco
Today, a product of
the Waco Tribune-Herald, Copyright 2002
