Red Ribbon Week Activities

To help you plan your Red Ribbon Week Activities (and make them as successful as possible), we have collected activity ideas for a variety of 'theme' days you can host all through the week. Use as many or as few of these activities as you need ... and don't be afraid to use your own creativity!

DECORATION DAY

Attend a City Council Meeting prior to Red Ribbon Week to allow the Mayor to issue the Red Ribbon Week Proclamation to kick-off the drug awareness activities.
Place red ribbons and bows all over your community - office buildings, posts, trees, billboards, mailboxes, bicycles, dogs, yourself, spouse, friends, boss, employees, buses, car antennas, front doors, fire trucks, police cars, hospitals, schools, etc.
Decorate your neighborhood malls and recreation centers, churches or synagogues, doctor's offices, corner businesses, pharmacies, the bank, the movies, grocery stores.
String a banner across the front of your school, your main street, the entrance to your football field, etc.
Hold Decoration Contests: doors, rooms, lockers, halls, bulletin boards, entry way, cafeteria, fences, trees at school; posters at all levels; houses; streets; blocks; cities.
Encourage your local media to highlight the Red Ribbon Week decorations. Publicize the winners in the Decoration Contests.
At school, utilize your Art class/club, Homeroom/Activity classes, Computer Graphics, Technical Drawing/Drafting.
In the community, involve the City Government, Civic Clubs, such as Rotary, Lion's, and Junior League, your volunteer organizations such as the Senior Citizens, and youth organizations such as YMCA, Boy and Girl Scouts.

INFORMATION DAY

Wear a Red Ribbon
Invite a Speaker to talk to your school, organization, or business about current drug trends.
Give a speech in your classroom, school, business, "Take a Stand", point out the harmful effects of tobacco, alcohol and other drugs on lives, families, brains, bodies, and futures.
Distribute drug information photocopied from the 1997 Red Ribbon Week Planning Guide to your school, class, business, neighborhood, church or synagogue.
Have a drawing each day of the Red Ribbon Week Campaign to give away a T-shirt with a drug-free message. Contestants must sign a drug-free pledge and receive some drug-free literature to be eligible.
At school, involve English, Social Studies, Science, Health, Speech, Journalism, and Audio-Visual Communications classes in research and reports regarding the current use and harmful effects of tobacco, alcohol and other drugs. Mathematics, and Economics classes could examine the effect on our economy regarding the costs of drug use, law enforcement, and public health care.
Critical thinking exercises include distinguishing between and evaluating fact and non-fact in advertising of tobacco and alcohol products. Here are some classroom exercises.
Intercom messages, audio or video, can be made daily to highlight the campaign activities and deliver the message of the harmful effects of drug use.

FAITH DAY

Wear a Red Ribbon
Pass out Red Ribbons to members of your Congregation.
Encourage your church to emphasize the Red Ribbon Week Campaign with special messages, sermons, and prayers.
Conduct a session on spirituality and substance abuse.
Provide information on substance abuse prevention, counseling and treatment resources available in your community.
Plan FUN, drug-free youth group activities.

REACH OUT DAY

Wear a Red Ribbon
Make sure your neighbors, and classmates wear Red Ribbons.
Ask your local mall to participate by passing our Red Ribbons.
Visit local nursing homes to share with them your hopes of a drug-free future and how Red Ribbon Week helps to achieve that goal.
Serve as a volunteer at a Red Ribbon Week event, give your time and energy to this cause.
Say at least 3 positive things to someone. Reach out to a newcomer, involve them in the Red Ribbon Week campaign for their new community. Take 5 minutes to actively listen to your child.
Take 5 minutes of your child's time to express clearly your stand on the use of tobacco, alcohol, and other drugs. Share drug prevention messages and encourage others to do the same.
Give someone a bow, lapel pin, ribbon, or button to wear.

WEAR RED RALLY DAY

Wear a Red Ribbon
Wear Red face paint
Have a crazy red hat contest
Wear red socks to show you're socking it to alcohol, tobacco and other drugs, decorate white socks with red ribbons.
Give an award to the class covered with the most red, award the class with the most people with red clothing, other than their red ribbons or bracelets, give them red candy as awards.
Don't miss a chance to parade in your Red Attire. Plan a parade in the halls, in the street around your school, down Main Street in your town, around the football field, show people that you are down on drug use in our community.
Have a rally at school, invite all the parents and neighbors.
Have a block rally in your neighborhood, dress the block red.
Have a rally at city hall, invite the entire community, include marching bands, cheerleaders, drill teams, and drug prevention speakers. Your Mayor can issue the Red Ribbon Week Proclamation for your town.
Encourage the media to visit your Red Ribbon Week Activities and share the drug prevention message with the rest of the community and state.
Dress your school in Red - make red construction paper window panes for all your windows.

PLEDGE DAY

Wear a Red Ribbon
Design your school's or class pledge card, make sure everyone has a chance to sign one.
Make family pledge cards, send them home to be signed by a parent, collect them and send them to your State Representative or Senator. Take a stand against drugs.
Put a banner on the walls in the halls at school or in the cafeteria, encourage everyone to sign a drug-free pledge and their names. Show the world that you are proud to be drug-free.
Designate locations at schools and businesses for people to sign their pledges.
Deliver the signed pledges cards and banners to your principal, mayor, legislator, and clergymen.
Have a contest to see which class/school can sign the most pledges. Invite the media to help you judge and share the information in the news.
Make pledges to be drug-free into links in a mile-long, block-long, hall-long chain, to demonstrate unity in your community against the harmful effects of tobacco, alcohol, and other drugs.
Write essays, poems, letters to editors, and short stories explaining what being drug-free means to you and your future. Describe a drug-free world and the differences your own children could have.
Have a contest to name as many drug-free activities as you can. Healthy choices are smart choices, "COME WITH ME AND BE DRUG FREE".

RECOGNITION DAY

Wear a Red Ribbon
Give special recognition awards to individuals and groups who have made outstanding contributions to tobacco, alcohol and other drug use prevention as a part of Red Ribbon Week and on-going in the community.
Create a Red Ribbon Hall of Fame, designate a special wall or create a scrapbook, plaque or place to display pictures of individuals, groups, businesses, and agencies who have made significant contributions to prevention efforts.
Recognize all the classes or individuals who have won the special Red Ribbon Week contests you have conducted during the campaign, even if they have already received their awards, include them in your list again.
Do not forget your teachers and administrators, recognize the time and energy they spent making Red Ribbon Week a success, let the media know about your extra special staff.
Moms and Dads need recognition too, take time to thank them for being drug-free, or pledging to be drug-free, and for making your home a safe place to live.
Write thank you letters to businesses in your community for celebrating Red Ribbon Week and setting strong role models for students in your town.
Give yourself a pat on the back for a job well done and make a commitment to get the drug prevention message out every day of the year.

SPORTS DAY

Wear a Red Ribbon
Distribute lapel pins or ribbons to marching band members to wear at the football game.
Put red stickers on the football helmets of each player and ribbons on the coaches and referees.
Cheerleaders create original drug-free cheers, teach the fans, wear red ribbons, make huge "run-through" paper signs for the team.
Decorate the grandstands with red crepe paper, display your winning contest posters on easels on the field during half-time.
Have a parade before the game or during half-time, carry drug prevention banners, include your school's clubs and other organizations which have contributed and pledged to be drug-free.
Invite your fellow school students to join you in the parade to demonstrate the strength of your commitment to be drug-free.
Start your parade a mile from the stadium, for "I'd walk a mile to be drug-free", invite the media to cover the walk.
Light candles at half-time, turn off the lights, and spend a moment of silence to remember those students who have lost their lives to drugs or the drug use of others, repeat your pledge to be drug-free,
Include all fall sports, soccer, volleyball, cross-country track, and wrestling in your celebration of the Red Ribbon Week Campaign.