FBSMV-Class Action

Class Action

The Class Action curriculum is based on a social-influences model for alcohol prevention. The program emphasizes the social and legal consequences of alcohol use and works toward meeting one of Project Northland’s strategies for high school students: increasing awareness of the social availability and social consequences of alcohol consumption.

The objectives of the program are the following:

Students will become aware of the legal issues surrounding underage alcohol use.

Students will recognize underage alcohol use as a community wide problem.

Students will discuss and debate the legal intricacies of alcohol-related issues.

Students will learn about the social, emotional, economic, and legal consequences of underage drinking.

Students’ norms concerning underage alcohol use will shift in a positive direction.

This curriculum exposes students to some of the legal issues and the potential consequences to society when alcohol is made available to minors and consumed by minors. Class Action differs from mock trials where students represent both sides of the legal cases and witnesses. Here students will role-play the plaintiff’s attorneys, not defense attorneys or witnesses. Class Action provides an opportunity to learn how teens’ individual decisions about underage drinking can have legal consequences. It is designed to broaden students’ perspectives beyond personal opinions and beliefs by requiring them to consider how state laws and legal precedents in other cases can be used in civil lawsuits brought by people who have been harmed by underage drinking.

Class Action is completed over eight to ten class sessions.

Six Different case scenarios are presented:

Case 1: Drinking & Driving on Trial

Case 2: Fetal Alcohol Syndrome on Trial

Case 3: Drinking & Violence on Trial

Case 4: Date Rape on Trial

Case 5: Drinking & Vandalism on Trial

Case 6: School Alcohol Policy on Trial

A key element to Class Action’s success is parental involvement. At the start of the course, a letter will be sent home to parents. This letter introduces the curriculum and encourages parents to talk to their teen about alcohol-related issues. In addition, a series of four postcards for parents accompany the curriculum and will be sent out through the course of the class.