ADDICTION EDUCATION for young people

One of our first presentations is the very impactive role play of a drug dealer. We have a large amount of experience of working with drug dealers, and we believe that to fully comprehend the drugs industry you must first understand the psyche and make-up of the hierarchical structure of drug dealing.

In these sessions we shock our audience with the true nature of the average drug dealer in our community. This has a huge emotional effect on the attendees, as most of them will have never before been confronted in such a frank way by an actual ex dealer.

This realistic depiction of how drug dealers operate in communities, and how young people are often unknowingly recruited into the drugs trade, will shock and inspire, and provide an eye-opening insight into the evils of a little-understood world.

The Choose Life play is as old as the Project itself and originated in HMP Liverpool, when a group of inmates wrote a script based on their introduction to alcohol and drugs. It portrays a situation that resonates with many young people, as it is a scenario that they can all relate to.

The play opens with a group of young people outside an off licence, where the older brother is bullying the younger ones into smoking, and taking alcohol and drugs.

Later we see the consequences of taking drugs as we follow the main character, and how his life descends into addiction, crime and jail along with the impact on his partner and son.

The young people watching our play will witness the plight of our protagonist, as the pressures of his brother and friends lead him into a hellish life of addiction and crime. His relationship with his family deteriorates, as his entire world begins to revolve around the acquisition and consumption of drugs and alcohol.

Yet even when he finally breaks his addiction the nightmare is not over, and the audience will share his emotional upheaval as they watch his continuing difficulties in staying drug free. 

This is a powerful and emotive dramatic performance that will stay with the class long after it is over, offering an unparalleled insight into the deeply personal consequences of addiction and its dramatic effects on families and relationships.

For young people in our community, as well as those getting caught up with using drugs, there are real risks of getting involved with unscrupulous older drug dealers who will seduce them with clever methods to sell drugs for them.

Our volunteers, most of them all recovered addicts themselves, will go through a PowerPoint presentation on drug dealing and explain to young people the tactics the dealers often use to influence them into selling their drugs.