Federal agency awards Mass. college $1.5 million grant to combat substance abuse.

Federal agency awards Mass. college $1.5 million grant to combat substance abuse. Fall River, Mass. -- Though the drunken exploits of WillFerrell's character in the DreamWorks film "Old School"may have made for great comedy, the substance abuse problem among 18- to24-year-old college students is quite serious, according to Dr. JoanDilonardo, organization and financing branch chief in the U.S. SubstanceAbuse and Mental Health Services Administration's Center forSubstance Abuse Treatment The Center for Substance Abuse Treatment (CSAT) is an agency of the United States government. It is a part of the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration (SAMHSA), within the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (DHHS). . "Because of the particular issue among people of college agein terms of their alcohol use--both heavy drinking, binge drinking andalso illicit substance abuse--we at the Center for Substance AbuseTreatment wanted to make sure that students are getting identified earlyin the course of a problem and that they're getting the kind ofhelp that they need," Dilonardo said. To that end, SAMHSA SAMHSA Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration announced the awarding of 12 Targeted CapacityExpansion Campus Screening and Brief Intervention grants totaling $15.5million over three years to fund treatment programs at institutions ofhigher education across the country. Massive state universities dominatethe list of grantees, including the University of Massachusetts The system includes UMass Amherst, UMass Boston, UMass Dartmouth (affiliated with Cape Cod Community College), UMass Lowell, and the UMass Medical School. It also has an online school called UMassOnline. , Amherst($473,789 annually) and UCLA's Integrated Substance, Abuse Program($500,000 annually). The sole community college to receive a grant was Bristol CommunityCollege Bristol Community College is a two-year community college in Fall River, Massachusetts. It offers associate degrees as well as a transfer program for students to earn credits toward transfer to other colleges. in Fall River, Mass. Their $500,000 annual award will fund aprogram aimed at tackling a pervasive addiction problem in one of thestate's poorest regions, said Dr. Fred Rocco, BCC's directorof advisement Deliberation; consultation.A court takes a case under advisement after it has heard the arguments made by the counsel of opposing sides in the lawsuit but before it renders its decision. ADVISEMENT. and counseling services. Rocco said that one of the twomain reasons SAMHSA chose BCC (Blind Carbon Copy) The field in an e-mail header that names additional recipients for the message. It is similar to carbon copy (cc), but the names do not appear in the recipient's message. Not all e-mail systems support the bcc feature. See fcc. is due to the college's collaborationwith Fall River-based nonprofit health care and social services providerStanley Street Treatment and Resources. SSTAR SSTAR Society for Sex Therapy and Research (Washington, DC)"[has] been involvedin a number of projects at BCC and with BCC students on various outreachand education programs. "The other piece of it is BCC is located in Fall River and NewBedford--communities [that] have significant issues regarding drug andalcohol use compared to the rest of the state," said Rocco."Since we are a community college, BCC services the entirecommunity, not necessarily just our students. I think given ourlocation, our good track record with other grants and activities andcertainly our long-term collaboration with a health agency partnerhelped get us a positive decision from the committee." Dilonardo, who oversaw the grant-giving process, said choosing oneproposal over another was done using an independent external committeeto ensure fairness. "The only people who were eligible to apply [for] thisparticular program were colleges and universities. External reviewersscore the applications we get against criteria that were in the grandannouncement, and then we fund applications based on their priorityscore or the score they got from this external review process,"Dilonardo said. "We had enough money to fund 12 grants, and in this particularannouncement, the 12 grants with the highest score are the 12 awardsthat we made. It happened to be that there was one community college inthat batch--I was glad to see that," she said. "But basically,who we award to is really based on this external review process, and thecommunity colleges were as eligible as all the other people." Because BCC is a commuter school, tackling a drug and alcoholproblem among students means tackling it in the neighborhoods they livein, Rocco said. The commuter population of BCC makes the program theyproposed unique, as opposed to other programs SAMHSA is funding forstudents at four-year colleges, which offer a relatively insulatedon-campus setting. "I think the particular program that Bristol Community Collegeproposed was obviously interesting as a way to kind of address theseproblems and ensure that the community colleges, which are part ofcommunities, actually become involved in ensuring that the people whoneed substance abuse services get the kinds of services that they need,which is really what we're about," Dilonardo said. Rocco says that Stanley Street Treatment Center CEO (1) (Chief Executive Officer) The highest individual in command of an organization. Typically the president of the company, the CEO reports to the Chairman of the Board. Nancy Paull wasinstrumental in getting the grant--she had done much of the necessaryresearch before meeting with Rocco, BCC's grant writer MarianneTaylor, BCC's health services chief Carol Constantine and othercollege officials to get the grant process started. "We justthought it was a great idea and much needed, so we picked up the ballthat she gave us and we work very well together, I think, between [BCCand SSTAR]. The rest just wrote itself in a sense, I guess." Dilonardo encourages community colleges to look out for SAMHSAgrant availability--plans for 2006 have not been finalized but should beforthcoming. Check www.samhsa.gov for further information.