Upstander Circle, Not Your Old D.A.R.E. Program Anymore.

Roosevelt High School Student Group Uses Lived Experiences to Make Change

High school can be exciting and overwhelming. New friendships, first-time jobs, applying for college, athletics, and more. For these students, a lot can happen in 4 years, including making a positive impact on their communities. Since 2021, Upstander Circle has centered on the idea that the students at Roosevelt High School can best identify and solve the problems they see every day.

What is Upstander Circle?

Upstander Circle and Rosevelt High School Senior Sumeya Muhammad (left) giving a bystander intervention presentation

VOA Oregon’s Prevention Services oversees the Upstander Circle program. Often, working closely with young people is likened to planting seeds. But, Melody Field, Prevention Services Coordinator, doesn’t quite see it like that. To her, she’s there to listen and enable the student’s vision for solving issues and problems facing their school community.

“They are the experts of their own lives. They know what’s relevant and important to them.” Melody said. “I’m not another adult telling them what to do. They lead the brainstorming; I give them as much as they need and let them go from there.”

But the students aren’t without structure. Upstander Circle departs from the prevention models championed in the 1980s and 1990s like D.A.R.E. Visit the D.A.R.E. website. Instead of ‘just say no,’ Prevention Services uses avenues like Upstander Circle to build trust and authentic connection. By trusting students and their expertise on their lived experiences, honest conversations can happen around substance use, gambling, and mental health. Melody says Upstander Circle stays within these topics as the students continue championing bystander intervention.

How Upstander Circle Has Made a Positive Impact

Senior and Upstander Circle participant Sumeya Muhammad says real change is visible in the hallways of Rosevelt. During passing periods, Sumeya says fights usually break out. However, since giving presentations and workshops to students, those who attended sessions with Upstander Circle don’t sit idly by and record a fight. Instead, they followed the training provided and got help from teachers nearby.

“I feel like [the program] has brought justice to my school – it helps a lot of students feel safe and heard,” Sumeya said. “To me, this prevention work means stopping the situation before it escalates or making a space where the problem wouldn’t start to begin with.”

Sumeya’s takeaways are exactly what Melody hopes all the students who participate take away. When you create a space where those closest to the issue problem-solve how to address it or prevent it from happening again – that can have a ripple effect outwards. Melody says these students take the feeling of making an actual change away with them at home and into their communities.

“It’s easier to build a bridge across a stream than it is [to build] over a rushing river.”

“It’s easier to build a bridge across a stream than it is [to build] over a rushing river,” Melody said. “That’s why it’s important for me to do this work. It’s interconnected. Youth having this information, even if they haven’t been impacted yet, hopefully, take it with them in the future.”