Attorney General Maura Healey announced that Project Here Games, an online app available for middle school students to practice healthy decision-making skills for substance use prevention, has been selected as a 2019 Parents’ Choice Gold Award winner.
“Project Here Games gives our young people the skills needed to make healthy choices, deal with stress and social pressures, and avoid substance use,” said AG Healey. “We are proud to be recognized by Parents’ Choice and grateful to our partners for their ongoing work helping us stop substance use before it starts.”
The Parents’ Choice Awards program, awarded by the Parents’ Choice Foundation, honors the best material for children, including books, toys, music, magazines, software, videogames, television and websites, each year. Parents’ Choice selected Project Here Games as its only 2019 Gold Award winner in the website category, calling the application’s content “skillfully designed” and applauding its thought-provoking hypothetical scenarios for allowing children to consider how different actions can have different outcomes.
AG Healey and the GE Foundation unveiled Project Here Games in September 2018 as part of Project Here, a $2 million public-private collaboration to make substance use prevention education available to all public middle schools in Massachusetts.
Project Here Games, developed by FableVision Studios in partnership with Health Resources in Action, teaches students about healthy choices, peer pressure, substance use and coping with stress through games, quizzes, and scenarios. The app helps students gain practical skills to navigate challenging situations and make healthy decisions as they grow up, and is available for free on computers, tablets, and smart phones. It can be used by teachers as an in-classroom activity or by students outside of school.
“Project Here is a great example of a public-private collaboration that is making real progress in helping students make healthy decisions,” said Ann R. Klee, President, GE Foundation. “Project Here Games is connecting with kids in innovative ways by bringing gamification to the fight against substance use and the opioid crisis.”
Learn more and register for Project Here at www.projectherema.org. Project Here Games is available at www.projectheregames.org.