Emily Tylek, project coordinator for the Encompass Coalition, told the Southborough Youth Commission on Jan. 13 that the coalition is focused on preventing youth alcohol and nicotine use while also offering opioid/Narcan training and mental‑health outreach across Northborough and Southborough.

The coalition, Tylek said, is supported by a Drug‑Free Communities grant that runs five years with the option to renew for another five — up to a 10‑year maximum — and provides $125,000 per year. “We are a substance use prevention coalition in Northborough and Southborough,” Tylek said. She outlined a steering committee that includes local health‑department staff, school wellness leaders and community program coordinators.

Why it matters: the coalition uses shared data and school partnerships to tailor prevention work, and local leaders said the approach both leverages grant funding and helps the towns plan programming for different grade levels.

Tylek reviewed recent and planned activities: PSA videos produced with the Northborough media connection, youth leadership trainings, multiple Narcan trainings (she said all 11th graders were trained in one recent session), and a newly energized youth coalition that added 10 members this year. She emphasized both classroom‑based refusal‑skills curricula and parent education sessions to align adult and youth perceptions of substance use.

On the data front, Tylek said the coalition is still working from 2023 MetroWest adolescent‑health survey results but expects updated 2025 data in March. The MetroWest survey is conducted and analyzed by an external contractor (Education Development Center, EDC), and she said school districts retain ownership of raw data and would control any requests for underlying datasets. “We’ll have fresh data really soon,” she said, noting the coalition plans to use the 2025 release to refine grade‑by‑grade interventions.

Tylek summarized regional trends from the 2021–2023 data showing continued declines in alcohol and nicotine use after the pandemic. She highlighted one notable change: for the first time in the MetroWest high‑school data, female students reported higher use than male students across several substances — a pattern she said mirrors national findings. On nicotine, electronic vaping products were cited as the most common delivery method, while cigarette smoking remained uncommon in the reported sample (she noted 2.7% short‑term cigarette use in one measure).

Commissioners asked about data quality and methods; Tylek said EDC handles cleaning and analysis and removes outliers before releasing highlight and full packets to districts and public wellness committees. She also described planned 2026 programs: a pilot 10th‑grade prevention unit in health class, additional Narcan trainings to reach remaining 11th graders, parent focus groups, webinars for caregivers, freshman orientation programming, and targeted focus groups (for example, female and LGBTQ youth) to better understand subgroup trends.

Tylek invited commission members and community partners to participate, join coalition meetings and review materials at encompasscoalition.org; she said contact information is available on the coalition website and social accounts for follow‑up questions.

The presentation concluded with commissioners praising the coalition’s outreach and noting potential opportunities to incorporate parent components like the newly released iCare tool, and with a reminder that the 2025 MetroWest data will be the next major evidence milestone for local planning.