Letter from our Executive Officers
Dear Friend:
Adolescent health and wellness are linked to future success in life: academic, economic, psychological and spiritual. Adolescents have an opportunity to assemble the fundamental building blocks of physical and mental well being to help them develop as healthy and fulfilled adults.
The AWARE (Adolescent Wellness through Access to Resources to
Education) Foundation was founded as a non-profit corporation in 1998
by a number of physicians concerned with the growing incidence of
adolescent health problems such as smoking, alcohol, teen pregnancy,
sexually transmitted diseases, and drug abuse. All of these problems
manifest potentially harmful long-term effects and indeed, sometimes
cause irrevocable damage to a teen's future.
Through our work in adolescent health, it has become clear that teenagers are a unique population with needs that differ dramatically from those of younger children or adults. We believe that meaningful information can be a key component in adolescent wellness and preventive health efforts. Today, adolescents are confronted with more information in a day than a teen may have absorbed in a year only a generation ago. Adolescents, generally a resourceful group regarding health issues, are in critical need of not more information, but better information that is concise, relevant and accessible.
The goal of the AWARE Foundation is to provide an integrated and focused information resource that leverages today’s technology and information and, most importantly, reaches adolescents in a safe and non-threatening way. Adolescents, parents, teachers, practitioners and professionals can log on to AWARE’s website to ask difficult questions, explore issues and get up-to-the-minute information; privately on a range of adolescent health issues.
AWARE provides “an informational haven” not only for teenagers, but also for those who are responsible for and care about them. The need is great and the resources are finite. We are currently receiving thousands of visits on our website and many e-mails weekly, which require responses to specific questions on adolescent health. The Philadelphia School Board’s Health and Sex Education Curriculum Committee, has designated our website as a valuable resource to students in grades 9-12.
Every visit to our website could make a difference in the health and future of one teen. The accumulated visits then become a community investment in the wellness and promise of a highly vulnerable population.
Please join us in supporting this important effort. Invest in adolescent wellness today for the well being of tomorrow’s adults by becoming a member of the AWARE Foundation. You can do this most easily by utilizing our online membership form.
Stephen Wray
Chairman of the Board
Alvin F. Goldfarb, M.D.
President and Executive Director