August 30, 2024 • 30 mins
Dr. Teandra Gordon is the Senior Program Director for BrainAbouts, an organization that has free online tools to help parents raise children to avoid drugs and alcohol. They work through schools, providing access to study packets to go along with the online courses. Online videos are available to all: www.brainabouts.org
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:06):
Welcome to Houston, PA, Houston's Public Affairs show, an iHeartMedia broadcast.
Our disclaimer says that the opinions express on this show
do not necessarily reflect those hell by this radio station.
It's management staff for any of its advertisers. My name
is Laurent and my guest today is doctor Tandra Gordon.
(00:28):
She is the senior program director for brain Abouts. They're
an online organization that is basically kind of like an
online university for kids, is to help them manage behavioral
problem programming. That's what it is, because you know, when
kids are in school and they're in their parents' house,
we're basically brainwashing them to be good citizens, hopefully, and
(00:52):
when we failed to do that, we end up with
violent kids and kids that go into other kind of
risky behavior that is self destructive life, alcohol abuse, drug abuse,
and even video game abuse. Will even talk about that
some video game addiction. You've heard me say some nice
things about some video games on this show, and I'm
a big fan, and I think that it has its
place as and entertainment and moderation, especially if you if
(01:14):
you're there to give some contact to your kid and
you make sure they play age appropriate games. You know,
you don't let them play violent R rated games when
they're eight. So it's it's that kind of thing that
brain Abouts takes care of ironing out and they enlist
the help of teachers and parents with an online program
that you can find at brainabouts dot org. Brainabouts dot org. Uh,
(01:39):
doctor Gordon, you have to explain to us a little
better than I did what brain abouts does, because you'll
you'll have a pretty extensive program that not only covers
a wide range of subject but you're targeting it to
kids of all ages just about especially since you have
a new program that you're going to start for pre
K kids.
Speaker 2 (01:58):
Yeah.
Speaker 3 (01:59):
So we are a neuroscience based high risk behavior prevention program.
So we teach kids about various high risk behaviors as
well as we focus on increasing executive functioning skills and
so executive yeah, so okay, So the program is based
(02:19):
on the we use the brain to prevent high risk behaviors.
And so the idea behind that is that we have
it's based on how our brain develops, and so from
zero to twelve years old, our limbic system is the
part of the brain that emerges as fully functioned, fully
functioning and fully developed. And so the limbic system is
(02:40):
responsible for our fight flight or freeze response.
Speaker 2 (02:44):
It is.
Speaker 3 (02:46):
It's what keeps us safe in emergencies. It's also there.
It's also the emotional part of our Brain's responsible for love,
for hate, for you know, lots all of the emotions
that we feel. It's socially stimulus. It is kind of
the impulsive kind of fun like, let's try something new, yeah,
(03:06):
type of brain. And so that part of the brain
is fully developed by twelve years old. Really, the part
of the brain that kind of keeps the limpics system
in check is not fully formed until twenty four or
twenty five years old. And that's the frontal lobe of
the brain.
Speaker 1 (03:23):
Can we ask mother nature how that works? It's say
you developed the safety system after putting the engine online.
So it's kind of like saying, we're gonna send this
car down the hill and once it crashes at the
bottom of the hill, will install the airbags. It's like, no,
do the other way around.
Speaker 3 (03:41):
My mom my thought is that that's why we have teachers,
we have parents, we have adults in the life of
kids to help, you know, to provide that stability to
provide that structure to help them during that stage of development.
Speaker 1 (03:57):
Oh wow, so I didn't. That's really that's an interesting perspective,
isn't it. The fact that we are capable of all
sorts of dangerous behaviors twice as fast as we become
capable to measure which behaviors will kill us, right, right.
Speaker 3 (04:14):
And that's why adolescence is such a prime time for
higherrisk behaviors all the way into college.
Speaker 2 (04:21):
Right.
Speaker 3 (04:22):
And so you think about you know, people's decisions in
college and how that happens because the problem solving, decision making,
long term planning part of our brain, the frontal lobe,
is not fully developed until twenty four or twenty five,
and so executive functioning skills are those skills of the
frontal lobe. And so part of the program is helping
(04:44):
kids to strengthen those skills and to use those skills.
And so from a young age we tell them the
more you use it, the more you're developing, you know,
the neurons and that part of the brain so that
it can get stronger earlier.
Speaker 1 (04:55):
So what kind of risky behavior are we talking about though?
Speaker 2 (04:58):
Anything?
Speaker 3 (04:59):
You can think about it, And part of our commitment
to schools is that we are ever evolving as the
risky behaviors evolve. So have we provide educational videos, handouts,
activity guides on marijuana, on other types of vaping, on
hierseexual behavior on all types of illicit drugs, alcohol, and so.
(05:24):
Our goal is to teach kids about these things scientifically,
about how they affect their brain, their body, their development.
We also include practical strategies for coping, let's say, with depression,
and so our videos are short, informative to the point
(05:45):
middle school and high school videos are about five to
seven minutes long. But our goal is that whenever a
kid is tempted with alcohol at a party, or with
marijuana or whatever may come into their life, that they
will have all already a knowledge base of if I
do this, then this will happen, so that when they're
(06:05):
faced with it, they can make educated decisions or.
Speaker 1 (06:08):
At least have a chance to do so, right, I.
Speaker 3 (06:11):
Mean, and not just do something not knowing how it
affects it'll affect them, you know, they will have at
least the knowledge to know what those potential consequences could be.
Speaker 1 (06:21):
Yeah, I guess that makes it an interesting point is
that most of most young people when they choose to
try a drug, they find out what the drug does
by trying the drug, which is ridiculous.
Speaker 2 (06:33):
And then the consequences can already be.
Speaker 1 (06:35):
Yes, right, so how long is it going to last?
So you should have asked yourself that question before you
did that. Yeah, So you're essentially opening the door to
having discussions that a lot of students can't have with
their parents because like that's the maybe something that you
don't want to say out loud because it sounds rude.
(06:55):
But the fact is, we do have a parental crisis
of this country.
Speaker 2 (07:00):
And part of.
Speaker 3 (07:02):
Our mission is to when a school becomes a brain
about school, they get access to our website that is full,
like you said, almost the university of information about these
various topics, and that school gets a log in for faculty,
for students, and for parents, because we want the entire
(07:23):
school community to have access to the same knowledge to
possibly facilitate the education and conversations between parents and children,
so that the parents are seeing what their students are
learning and that they can all be on the same page.
Speaker 1 (07:39):
You measure, you measure somehow your success.
Speaker 2 (07:42):
We do. So we have a pre and post survey that.
Speaker 3 (07:46):
We do with schools, and it's really the CDC. They
have a High Risk Behavior survey, and so we modify
it a little bit and it's designed to be given
at the beginning of the school year to assess students
well for middle school and high school, to assess their
engagement in certain behaviors, and then at the end of
the school yeard to see how that has shifted. For
(08:08):
our elementary our assessment looks like just how much does
does the student know about their brain, about their body,
about managing coping skills and managing different things, And so
we do a pre and post with them to see
how much they know at the beginning, how much they
know at the end, and we see their knowledge base
increase tremendously, which has been a wonderful, wonderful feedback for us.
(08:31):
And so they're learning the information, they're learning the different tools,
they're learning how to cope because our curriculum also addresses
various mental health challenges like depression, anxiety, that kind of thing,
and so they're learning the vocabulary associated with these different things,
because a lot of times kids experience stuff but they
(08:53):
don't have the words for what they're experiencing and so
we're seeing just an increase in conversations regarding mental health
substance of vis HIGHRIS behaviors. And we're still a fairly
young organization, so we're looking for more schools to do,
(09:14):
especially at the middle school and high school level, to
do that pre and post regarding how it's affecting student behavior.
Speaker 1 (09:20):
Yeah, I guess you're pointing out something that's pretty obvious
if you think about two seconds, and that is that
if you don't have the tools to talk about something,
it's difficult to explain to anyone what you're going through.
But on the other hand, we just call that teenager.
That you being a teenager anyway. So the point being
that the program is available to anyone. You don't actually
(09:41):
have to be a teacher or a school. You can
take a look at it right well.
Speaker 3 (09:44):
So we welcome everybody to our website. We plan to
initially make it to where parents can access it directly,
but right now are we're targeting schools in school systems,
and so we're looking for different schools to become brain
about school. And when that school becomes a brain about school,
then the parents, the faculty, the students, everybody within that
(10:06):
school community have access to it.
Speaker 1 (10:07):
So you're really trying to recruit teachers to get into
the school administrators counselors. Yes, so you can go to
brain about dot org brain about dot org to find
out how the program works. The website includes an application
processor you know.
Speaker 3 (10:23):
Yes it does, and within that we also provide amazing
assemblies like our brain about schools. They'll come to us
and say, hey, we've been having a challenge with bullying
or alcohol and we do amazing assemblies for our schools.
Speaker 2 (10:37):
So we really and we.
Speaker 3 (10:39):
Maintained consistent communication. Our goal is to walk alongside them,
to work with them, to partner with them, to help
their students have the best opportunity to make good decisions
and reach their potential.
Speaker 1 (10:56):
You are listening to Houston, PA, Houston's Public Affairs Show.
My name is Laurent and my guest today is doctor
Tandre Gordon. She is the senior program director for brain Abouts.
As I said, they're online at brainabouts or orgy. There's
a bunch of organizations that track the mental health of
students and the number of students who report having depressive
(11:19):
feelings and dealing with depression or bullying, which will engender
depression is higher than you can imagine. I don't know
how you can trust anyone's numbers, but when you keep
seeing numbers that are in you know, twenty thirty, forty
fifty percent, you know that the range is going to
be somewhere between there. Realistically speaking, So even if we
(11:40):
only count that twenty percent of the students that have
these these problems, they're triggered by bad behavior of other students,
that seems catastrophic to me. Because on top of that,
there's the natural tendency for teenagers, especially teenage girls, have
to have problems. It's difficult being a teenager, especially for girls.
They transform very visibly, and they transform at a different
(12:04):
rate than their friends. It's it becomes really thorny.
Speaker 2 (12:09):
Yeah, I feel like.
Speaker 3 (12:10):
Being a teenager is different difficult for guys.
Speaker 1 (12:14):
But I think it's more it's harder for girls.
Speaker 2 (12:16):
I think, and and you know, there's different pressures.
Speaker 3 (12:20):
I think that girls, I think, I think guys struggle too,
and but I think girls, for sure, girls are more
probably more likely to express it and to reach out
for help. I think that guys often struggle, you know, internally,
and and and those behaviors you know, they may express
(12:42):
it in their behaviors as opposed to you know, in
conversation and talking about it. And part of it is
how the brain develops, right, and so because when you're
in that adolescent stage, you have big emotions, and so
you know, when you break up with that boyfriend or girlfriend,
then it just seems like end of the world because
you don't have the life experience or even the frontal
(13:05):
lobe development to know this too show pass like things
can get better, and so if it can be a
really challenging stage in development being a teenager, and depression
is a big part of what a lot of teens experiences. Unfortunately.
I think there's a lot of pressures, and I think
that social media and the Internet kind of adds to that.
(13:26):
There's this expectation of being this certain kind of way
and there's or living this certain kind of life. And
I think that teenagers really feel that because I think
as you grow, when you get life experiences, you realize, Okay,
everybody might not really be who they perceive to be,
you know on the internet. But I think as an adolescent,
(13:48):
like you're trying to figure out who you are, and
there's all of these different images of who you should be,
and it can be a really difficult time.
Speaker 2 (13:58):
You know.
Speaker 3 (13:58):
In sech hology we call that stage of development identity
versus identity confusion. And so an adolescents job is to
figure out who they are apart from who their parents
told them to be. And so in that process of
discovering who they are, it can be a very confusing process,
(14:20):
a very difficult process, but that's a part of growing up.
And so our.
Speaker 2 (14:28):
Goal is to aid in that.
Speaker 3 (14:31):
Time in development, to aid in education for faculty, for parents,
for students about that time of development, to give students
tools to cope during that time of development, to give
them information that as they're faced with various temptations, that
(14:52):
they would be able to make educated decisions during that
time of development.
Speaker 1 (14:57):
How do you approach teaching some of the basics of
the kids. You briefly mentioned that you have a new
program for pre K through second grade. So we're talking
about tiny little kids, right, and that seems to be
a completely different subject to me. I see how it's related.
Speaker 3 (15:13):
Obviously, in pre K through second grade, we have taken
the character education curriculum from various states and use that
to create our pre K through second curriculum, So the
students in that curriculum we'll learn about honesty and responsibility,
and so it's kind of setting this self control, it's
kind of setting this foundation, and that's kind of the
(15:35):
beginning of our program. In elementary school, we build upon that.
We teach them about various mental health strategies for coping.
We teach them about self control again, about self esteem,
about managing their emotions, about being a good friend, and
(15:58):
so it builds upon that. And then as the kids
get older in middle school in high school, they learn,
you know, about the various highrisk behaviors that they are
going to be faced with at some point in their development,
and so our goal is to provide education about that
so that they can make informed decisions.
Speaker 1 (16:16):
It sounds like you're kind of taking the place. No,
that's the wrong taking the place, and that you're you're
adding to the parenting. But in some kids, we know
that some of their behavioral problems are because their parents
are just completely absent for their lives.
Speaker 2 (16:29):
Yeah, well, I wouldn't say.
Speaker 3 (16:31):
We're We're walking alongside administrators, teachers, and parents providing information
and our and our information is research based, like we
you know, I might be saying it in a certain way,
but we do not.
Speaker 2 (16:45):
Say do this, do that, do this, do that.
Speaker 3 (16:47):
What we teach kids is what the research says about
how various alcohol and drugs affect the brain and body.
And we don't say don't do drugs. We just say, Okay,
when you smoke marijuana, this happens, this happens, this happens,
this happens. This is how it affects your brain. This
is how it affects your body, This is how it
affects your your This is what research is about how
(17:08):
it affects your future. And then at the end of
every video, it's like, so, what decision will you make?
So we just we're not like, just say no to
drugs or just say no.
Speaker 1 (17:17):
To this or that didn't work.
Speaker 3 (17:19):
It's not morally you know, We're providing information so that
they can make educated decisions.
Speaker 1 (17:25):
So do you do the kids react to For instance,
we know that if they start smoking marijuana at a
young age, before they're in their early twenties, basically before
the brain is completely developed, right, that marijuana is literally
going to stunt the development of their brain. It's like
putting the brakes on it. It can and the more.
(17:46):
And if you smoke a lot of it, then your
brain just doesn't develop in some areas and then it's
too you know that, right, that's I think you're right.
Speaker 2 (17:54):
So that's what we do, is.
Speaker 3 (17:55):
We give them information that when you're smoking marijuana, your
frontal lobe turns off. It's off during that time of
being high, right, And so if you're getting high three
to four times a week and then it stops because
adolescence that's the time of frontal lobe development, you know,
from twelve to twenty four and twenty five years old.
(18:15):
And so if you spend your adolescence drunk or high,
then is that part of your brain is not developing.
And that's the part of your brain that helps you
to be successful in adulthood, that helps you to leave
your parents home and be able to manage a life
on your own, problem solving, decision making. And so our
(18:35):
goal is to educate kids about how these different things
affects them so that they know that because a lot
of people.
Speaker 2 (18:42):
Don't know that.
Speaker 1 (18:43):
And then you know, they're grown ups and they don't
have the psychological training, the life experience to deal with
all kinds of things, but also their ability to understand
how things work, and not just how things work, but
also how relationship with other people work. That's gone forever.
(19:03):
It becomes really difficult to modify that kind of behavior
if it hasn't been properly washed out.
Speaker 3 (19:11):
And research shows that ninety percent of adults that are
addicted to some kind of a substance started using when
they were teens. And so if we can at least
delay that use of those substances, you're right, there's a
higher likelihood that it won't develop into addiction.
Speaker 1 (19:29):
You're listening to Houston PA, Houston's Public Affairs show. My
name is Laurent. My guest is doctor Tandra Gordon. She
is a senior program director for brain Abouts. By the way,
she is a licensed marriage and family therapist, and she
was also a kindergarten teacher, so don't mess with her.
The people who developed the authority to control little people
(19:51):
are the most dangerous disciplinarians out there.
Speaker 3 (19:55):
So funny, it really is cool how life happens. Because
I started my careers in the elementary school team. Yeah,
and then I work for the Council and Recovery where
I work with substance abuse, and then I combined education
and therapy. In my work, I became vice president of
school based Health and oversalid school based health Clinics and
(20:16):
now get to combine all of that in the work
that I do at brain Abouts.
Speaker 2 (20:19):
It's really cool.
Speaker 1 (20:19):
You also worked with our friends at the Legacy Health
Clinics I did.
Speaker 2 (20:24):
Yeah, my friends.
Speaker 1 (20:26):
They used to be called the Montrose Clinic. For those
of us who have been around since the mid nineties,
that's how I found out about them. They used to
provide a free and anonymous age testing back in the
mid nineties. Such a rich history, rich history of doing
the right thing by people to keep them safe but
also out of trouble, because back then that kind of
(20:48):
testing could be the kind of news that might destroy
your family relationship. I think we're mostly long past that
from most of us, but they were one of the
great organizations that helped to move that forward by just
doing the right thing and then facilitized and then they
didn't try to indoctrinate eight people, just say we're making
this available, it's the right thing to do, it's safe,
(21:09):
you can get tested, and then you know, and then
you can stop the spread. And now we live in
a world where being diagnosed with HIV most likely will
not lead to AIDS. And it's not a it's not
at all. It's well, it's a great inconvenience, and it's
an inconvenience you've got to be really watchful about. But so,
(21:30):
good job, a nice career, I would say thus far.
Speaker 3 (21:34):
Yeah, when I started with the school based health program
at Legacy, there were seven clinics and one school system,
and I was oversaw the program. So it's growth to
thirty three clinics about across three school system thirty and
so I'm really proud of that work and I'm proud
that it continues, and I'm grateful for it. And that's
been my career, is just really being a part of
(21:56):
mission minded organizations that just want to help, and so
I'm grateful to be continuing that with Brainabouts.
Speaker 1 (22:03):
We should give out their website if you're interested in
getting more information about the Legacy Health Clinic. They're online
at Legacy Communityhealth dot org. Legacy Communityhealth dot org. I
would like to mention that you're being funded by the
John Fontaine Junior Charity, which was started by John Fontaine's
(22:25):
parents after John was killed in a car accident. You
explained to me that he was not the one driving.
He happens to be the victim of an accident which
was at least partially caused by a driver who was
highly inebriated.
Speaker 3 (22:42):
Yeah, so mission minor organizations. Brainabouts comes from a family
a tragedy. Jack Fontaine had been sober for many years, and.
Speaker 1 (22:56):
That's the dad, the dad, and.
Speaker 3 (22:58):
Then his son John, you know, was at a party.
He didn't know drinking, was Jack and Nancy didn't know drinking.
What's going on? But you know, John got into a
car with a friend that had been drinking, and within
minutes he would they got into an accident and John
was killed immediately. And within a month of mourning the
loss of their son, Jack and Nancy made a commitment
(23:21):
and a promise to John that they would do everything
that they could to reduce tragic phone calls, to reduce
other families from receiving a phone call like the one
that they received that night. And so that is where
brainabouts was birthed, is through a commitment to provide education.
Because you know, if you ever talk to Jack, he's like,
(23:42):
if one person at that party had said, no, not
get in that car, y'all.
Speaker 2 (23:47):
Have been drinking.
Speaker 3 (23:48):
And so that is what brain Abouts is is providing education,
providing conversations that people may not have without an intervention
like this.
Speaker 1 (24:00):
You're part of your programs that you're developing is a
new Tier three program. It's an intervention program that you're
doing an association with a professor Stanford University. This sounds
really cool, but that sounds like a big step forward.
In other words, your programs are developing and evolving.
Speaker 3 (24:16):
We are, I mean we are like always on the move,
and that's one mark of our program. It's really because
society is always on the move, and our commitment is
to keep up with where students are and meet them
where they are and give them what they need and.
Speaker 1 (24:30):
So and deal with the new addictions made available by
new technology.
Speaker 3 (24:34):
Right exactly exactly whatever's coming up, we're researching it and
creating information and education so that everybody knows about it
and it's how it's affecting them. So, yeah, we're very
excited about our Tier three program Brainabouts. Overall, it's focused
on prevention, but this program is going to be focused
on intervention with students that may had may have.
Speaker 2 (24:57):
Gotten in trouble at school.
Speaker 3 (24:58):
For you know, some type of high risk behavior or
maybe struggling with some type of high risk behavior. And
so it's based on the work of doctor Anna Link,
who is a Stanford professor, and she uses the acronym
dopamine as a source of an intervention. And so our
Tier three program is focused on that and we're really
(25:20):
excited about developing that this year.
Speaker 1 (25:22):
And when you mean Tier three, those are older kids.
Speaker 3 (25:25):
No, No, so Tier three. So in terms of school
Tier one we talk about we use that term when
we're talking about like every student in the school, you know,
and so prevention and then Tier three and Tier two
is kind of maybe a smaller group that you might
have small some type of small group intervention with them.
And then Tier three is kind of that one on
(25:46):
one you know, maybe they've gotten in trouble, they're really
struggling in some place, and so they need that one
on one intervention with a counselor. And what we're providing
is a tool for those counselors to use to intervene
with those students.
Speaker 1 (25:59):
And when you're using the word intervention, what you mean
is that a teacher or a counselor, as you mentioned,
will reach out to the students and make themselves available
to them, right.
Speaker 3 (26:09):
And so a lot of times when kids get in
trouble at school, there's just a consequence, right, Okay, you know,
you've got caught vaping in the restroom, so now you're
suspended or this or that.
Speaker 2 (26:20):
What we want to.
Speaker 3 (26:21):
Provide is a source of change, a source where they
can learn and grow from an experience and not just
be punished, but learn and possibly make different choices next time.
And so we want to meet kids where they are
and provide a place that allows them to make better choices.
Speaker 1 (26:44):
So an open door policy for all.
Speaker 3 (26:46):
Basically everybody has potential, and we want to help as
many kids that are willing to meet that potential.
Speaker 1 (26:55):
I think that it's extremely useful to have something like
bring Abouts in the school system because you can have
an open door policy, as I mentioned, But very often
the teenagers or the young kids that most need help
won't come through that door. They're not going to do
it voluntarily. Yeah, and it's maybe part because they don't
understand what that means. You don't know what's in their head,
(27:18):
and it's not hard to imagine that they will be
fearful of getting in trouble if they talk to anyone
about these problems. Yeah, So you're essentially sort of in
a blanketed kind of way, you're saying, hey, you know what,
if you're dealing with this, yes, that's not you don't
get in trouble for that.
Speaker 2 (27:35):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (27:36):
And if you never heard that before, it can be
an epiphany.
Speaker 3 (27:39):
Yes, And so like a brain about So our program
is designed so like we have videos on each one
of our topics, and so that video might be five
to seven minutes. Along with that is an activity guide
that fosters communication and discussion. And this is on the
prevention side with it between teacher and students, and and
(28:00):
then activities where the student might have like a journaling
activity or something to further think about or process or
internalize what they've learned from the video. And at the
end of every video is like, you know, this is
what it is, and if you're struggling with this, this
is what you can do.
Speaker 2 (28:17):
And so it creates.
Speaker 3 (28:21):
Education, you know, Like we talked about earlier, kids often
go through things, but they don't have the words to
articulate what they're going through, and then they don't know
what to do to help themselves with what they're going
through and so our goal is that all of these topics,
introducing these things to them will give them words for
what they're experiencing and an avenue to be able to
(28:43):
reach out for help. And we are a mission minded organization.
We're powered by the John Fontaine Junior Charity, and the
charity is very much focused on cost not being a
barrier to our program getting in schools and so.
Speaker 1 (28:58):
Well, I mean all your videos are free click whatever.
Speaker 3 (29:02):
Yeah, wherever you are, as far as you know a school,
whether your school has a big budget or small budget,
brain abouts istory you.
Speaker 1 (29:10):
It's awesome. It it sort of comes as a package
that works. All you have to do is turn it on,
so to speak. So just go to brainabouts dot org.
Brainabouts dot org. That's how you can find out how
the program works because you'll see and you'll get an
idea of how it works by watching it work. And
you can get in contact with them and start the
process of having them in your school or make sure
(29:33):
that your your your students can have access to it.
And as usual, if you have any questions related to Houston, PA,
you can just send me an email Texan from France
at gmail dot com and you'll get an answer, and
I want to thank you for caring about the issues
I put on this show. I'll be here at the
same time next week, and I thank you for listening. Folks.
My name is Laurent I am the Texan from France
(29:55):
and this has been Houston PA, Houston's public affairs show,
Houston Strong
Welcome to Houston, PA, Houston's Public Affairs show, an iHeartMedia broadcast.
Our disclaimer says that the opinions express on this show
do not necessarily reflect those hell by this radio station.
It's management staff for any of its advertisers. My name
is Laurent and my guest today is doctor Tandra Gordon.
(00:28):
She is the senior program director for brain Abouts. They're
an online organization that is basically kind of like an
online university for kids, is to help them manage behavioral
problem programming. That's what it is, because you know, when
kids are in school and they're in their parents' house,
we're basically brainwashing them to be good citizens, hopefully, and
(00:52):
when we failed to do that, we end up with
violent kids and kids that go into other kind of
risky behavior that is self destructive life, alcohol abuse, drug abuse,
and even video game abuse. Will even talk about that
some video game addiction. You've heard me say some nice
things about some video games on this show, and I'm
a big fan, and I think that it has its
place as and entertainment and moderation, especially if you if
(01:14):
you're there to give some contact to your kid and
you make sure they play age appropriate games. You know,
you don't let them play violent R rated games when
they're eight. So it's it's that kind of thing that
brain Abouts takes care of ironing out and they enlist
the help of teachers and parents with an online program
that you can find at brainabouts dot org. Brainabouts dot org. Uh,
(01:39):
doctor Gordon, you have to explain to us a little
better than I did what brain abouts does, because you'll
you'll have a pretty extensive program that not only covers
a wide range of subject but you're targeting it to
kids of all ages just about especially since you have
a new program that you're going to start for pre
K kids.
Speaker 2 (01:58):
Yeah.
Speaker 3 (01:59):
So we are a neuroscience based high risk behavior prevention program.
So we teach kids about various high risk behaviors as
well as we focus on increasing executive functioning skills and
so executive yeah, so okay, So the program is based
(02:19):
on the we use the brain to prevent high risk behaviors.
And so the idea behind that is that we have
it's based on how our brain develops, and so from
zero to twelve years old, our limbic system is the
part of the brain that emerges as fully functioned, fully
functioning and fully developed. And so the limbic system is
(02:40):
responsible for our fight flight or freeze response.
Speaker 2 (02:44):
It is.
Speaker 3 (02:46):
It's what keeps us safe in emergencies. It's also there.
It's also the emotional part of our Brain's responsible for love,
for hate, for you know, lots all of the emotions
that we feel. It's socially stimulus. It is kind of
the impulsive kind of fun like, let's try something new, yeah,
(03:06):
type of brain. And so that part of the brain
is fully developed by twelve years old. Really, the part
of the brain that kind of keeps the limpics system
in check is not fully formed until twenty four or
twenty five years old. And that's the frontal lobe of
the brain.
Speaker 1 (03:23):
Can we ask mother nature how that works? It's say
you developed the safety system after putting the engine online.
So it's kind of like saying, we're gonna send this
car down the hill and once it crashes at the
bottom of the hill, will install the airbags. It's like, no,
do the other way around.
Speaker 3 (03:41):
My mom my thought is that that's why we have teachers,
we have parents, we have adults in the life of
kids to help, you know, to provide that stability to
provide that structure to help them during that stage of development.
Speaker 1 (03:57):
Oh wow, so I didn't. That's really that's an interesting perspective,
isn't it. The fact that we are capable of all
sorts of dangerous behaviors twice as fast as we become
capable to measure which behaviors will kill us, right, right.
Speaker 3 (04:14):
And that's why adolescence is such a prime time for
higherrisk behaviors all the way into college.
Speaker 2 (04:21):
Right.
Speaker 3 (04:22):
And so you think about you know, people's decisions in
college and how that happens because the problem solving, decision making,
long term planning part of our brain, the frontal lobe,
is not fully developed until twenty four or twenty five,
and so executive functioning skills are those skills of the
frontal lobe. And so part of the program is helping
(04:44):
kids to strengthen those skills and to use those skills.
And so from a young age we tell them the
more you use it, the more you're developing, you know,
the neurons and that part of the brain so that
it can get stronger earlier.
Speaker 1 (04:55):
So what kind of risky behavior are we talking about though?
Speaker 2 (04:58):
Anything?
Speaker 3 (04:59):
You can think about it, And part of our commitment
to schools is that we are ever evolving as the
risky behaviors evolve. So have we provide educational videos, handouts,
activity guides on marijuana, on other types of vaping, on
hierseexual behavior on all types of illicit drugs, alcohol, and so.
(05:24):
Our goal is to teach kids about these things scientifically,
about how they affect their brain, their body, their development.
We also include practical strategies for coping, let's say, with depression,
and so our videos are short, informative to the point
(05:45):
middle school and high school videos are about five to
seven minutes long. But our goal is that whenever a
kid is tempted with alcohol at a party, or with
marijuana or whatever may come into their life, that they
will have all already a knowledge base of if I
do this, then this will happen, so that when they're
(06:05):
faced with it, they can make educated decisions or.
Speaker 1 (06:08):
At least have a chance to do so, right, I.
Speaker 3 (06:11):
Mean, and not just do something not knowing how it
affects it'll affect them, you know, they will have at
least the knowledge to know what those potential consequences could be.
Speaker 1 (06:21):
Yeah, I guess that makes it an interesting point is
that most of most young people when they choose to
try a drug, they find out what the drug does
by trying the drug, which is ridiculous.
Speaker 2 (06:33):
And then the consequences can already be.
Speaker 1 (06:35):
Yes, right, so how long is it going to last?
So you should have asked yourself that question before you
did that. Yeah, So you're essentially opening the door to
having discussions that a lot of students can't have with
their parents because like that's the maybe something that you
don't want to say out loud because it sounds rude.
(06:55):
But the fact is, we do have a parental crisis
of this country.
Speaker 2 (07:00):
And part of.
Speaker 3 (07:02):
Our mission is to when a school becomes a brain
about school, they get access to our website that is full,
like you said, almost the university of information about these
various topics, and that school gets a log in for faculty,
for students, and for parents, because we want the entire
(07:23):
school community to have access to the same knowledge to
possibly facilitate the education and conversations between parents and children,
so that the parents are seeing what their students are
learning and that they can all be on the same page.
Speaker 1 (07:39):
You measure, you measure somehow your success.
Speaker 2 (07:42):
We do. So we have a pre and post survey that.
Speaker 3 (07:46):
We do with schools, and it's really the CDC. They
have a High Risk Behavior survey, and so we modify
it a little bit and it's designed to be given
at the beginning of the school year to assess students
well for middle school and high school, to assess their
engagement in certain behaviors, and then at the end of
the school yeard to see how that has shifted. For
(08:08):
our elementary our assessment looks like just how much does
does the student know about their brain, about their body,
about managing coping skills and managing different things, And so
we do a pre and post with them to see
how much they know at the beginning, how much they
know at the end, and we see their knowledge base
increase tremendously, which has been a wonderful, wonderful feedback for us.
(08:31):
And so they're learning the information, they're learning the different tools,
they're learning how to cope because our curriculum also addresses
various mental health challenges like depression, anxiety, that kind of thing,
and so they're learning the vocabulary associated with these different things,
because a lot of times kids experience stuff but they
(08:53):
don't have the words for what they're experiencing and so
we're seeing just an increase in conversations regarding mental health
substance of vis HIGHRIS behaviors. And we're still a fairly
young organization, so we're looking for more schools to do,
(09:14):
especially at the middle school and high school level, to
do that pre and post regarding how it's affecting student behavior.
Speaker 1 (09:20):
Yeah, I guess you're pointing out something that's pretty obvious
if you think about two seconds, and that is that
if you don't have the tools to talk about something,
it's difficult to explain to anyone what you're going through.
But on the other hand, we just call that teenager.
That you being a teenager anyway. So the point being
that the program is available to anyone. You don't actually
(09:41):
have to be a teacher or a school. You can
take a look at it right well.
Speaker 3 (09:44):
So we welcome everybody to our website. We plan to
initially make it to where parents can access it directly,
but right now are we're targeting schools in school systems,
and so we're looking for different schools to become brain
about school. And when that school becomes a brain about school,
then the parents, the faculty, the students, everybody within that
(10:06):
school community have access to it.
Speaker 1 (10:07):
So you're really trying to recruit teachers to get into
the school administrators counselors. Yes, so you can go to
brain about dot org brain about dot org to find
out how the program works. The website includes an application
processor you know.
Speaker 3 (10:23):
Yes it does, and within that we also provide amazing
assemblies like our brain about schools. They'll come to us
and say, hey, we've been having a challenge with bullying
or alcohol and we do amazing assemblies for our schools.
Speaker 2 (10:37):
So we really and we.
Speaker 3 (10:39):
Maintained consistent communication. Our goal is to walk alongside them,
to work with them, to partner with them, to help
their students have the best opportunity to make good decisions
and reach their potential.
Speaker 1 (10:56):
You are listening to Houston, PA, Houston's Public Affairs Show.
My name is Laurent and my guest today is doctor
Tandre Gordon. She is the senior program director for brain Abouts.
As I said, they're online at brainabouts or orgy. There's
a bunch of organizations that track the mental health of
students and the number of students who report having depressive
(11:19):
feelings and dealing with depression or bullying, which will engender
depression is higher than you can imagine. I don't know
how you can trust anyone's numbers, but when you keep
seeing numbers that are in you know, twenty thirty, forty
fifty percent, you know that the range is going to
be somewhere between there. Realistically speaking, So even if we
(11:40):
only count that twenty percent of the students that have
these these problems, they're triggered by bad behavior of other students,
that seems catastrophic to me. Because on top of that,
there's the natural tendency for teenagers, especially teenage girls, have
to have problems. It's difficult being a teenager, especially for girls.
They transform very visibly, and they transform at a different
(12:04):
rate than their friends. It's it becomes really thorny.
Speaker 2 (12:09):
Yeah, I feel like.
Speaker 3 (12:10):
Being a teenager is different difficult for guys.
Speaker 1 (12:14):
But I think it's more it's harder for girls.
Speaker 2 (12:16):
I think, and and you know, there's different pressures.
Speaker 3 (12:20):
I think that girls, I think, I think guys struggle too,
and but I think girls, for sure, girls are more
probably more likely to express it and to reach out
for help. I think that guys often struggle, you know, internally,
and and and those behaviors you know, they may express
(12:42):
it in their behaviors as opposed to you know, in
conversation and talking about it. And part of it is
how the brain develops, right, and so because when you're
in that adolescent stage, you have big emotions, and so
you know, when you break up with that boyfriend or girlfriend,
then it just seems like end of the world because
you don't have the life experience or even the frontal
(13:05):
lobe development to know this too show pass like things
can get better, and so if it can be a
really challenging stage in development being a teenager, and depression
is a big part of what a lot of teens experiences. Unfortunately.
I think there's a lot of pressures, and I think
that social media and the Internet kind of adds to that.
(13:26):
There's this expectation of being this certain kind of way
and there's or living this certain kind of life. And
I think that teenagers really feel that because I think
as you grow, when you get life experiences, you realize, Okay,
everybody might not really be who they perceive to be,
you know on the internet. But I think as an adolescent,
(13:48):
like you're trying to figure out who you are, and
there's all of these different images of who you should be,
and it can be a really difficult time.
Speaker 2 (13:58):
You know.
Speaker 3 (13:58):
In sech hology we call that stage of development identity
versus identity confusion. And so an adolescents job is to
figure out who they are apart from who their parents
told them to be. And so in that process of
discovering who they are, it can be a very confusing process,
(14:20):
a very difficult process, but that's a part of growing up.
And so our.
Speaker 2 (14:28):
Goal is to aid in that.
Speaker 3 (14:31):
Time in development, to aid in education for faculty, for parents,
for students about that time of development, to give students
tools to cope during that time of development, to give
them information that as they're faced with various temptations, that
(14:52):
they would be able to make educated decisions during that
time of development.
Speaker 1 (14:57):
How do you approach teaching some of the basics of
the kids. You briefly mentioned that you have a new
program for pre K through second grade. So we're talking
about tiny little kids, right, and that seems to be
a completely different subject to me. I see how it's related.
Speaker 3 (15:13):
Obviously, in pre K through second grade, we have taken
the character education curriculum from various states and use that
to create our pre K through second curriculum, So the
students in that curriculum we'll learn about honesty and responsibility,
and so it's kind of setting this self control, it's
kind of setting this foundation, and that's kind of the
(15:35):
beginning of our program. In elementary school, we build upon that.
We teach them about various mental health strategies for coping.
We teach them about self control again, about self esteem,
about managing their emotions, about being a good friend, and
(15:58):
so it builds upon that. And then as the kids
get older in middle school in high school, they learn,
you know, about the various highrisk behaviors that they are
going to be faced with at some point in their development,
and so our goal is to provide education about that
so that they can make informed decisions.
Speaker 1 (16:16):
It sounds like you're kind of taking the place. No,
that's the wrong taking the place, and that you're you're
adding to the parenting. But in some kids, we know
that some of their behavioral problems are because their parents
are just completely absent for their lives.
Speaker 2 (16:29):
Yeah, well, I wouldn't say.
Speaker 3 (16:31):
We're We're walking alongside administrators, teachers, and parents providing information
and our and our information is research based, like we
you know, I might be saying it in a certain way,
but we do not.
Speaker 2 (16:45):
Say do this, do that, do this, do that.
Speaker 3 (16:47):
What we teach kids is what the research says about
how various alcohol and drugs affect the brain and body.
And we don't say don't do drugs. We just say, Okay,
when you smoke marijuana, this happens, this happens, this happens,
this happens. This is how it affects your brain. This
is how it affects your body, This is how it
affects your your This is what research is about how
(17:08):
it affects your future. And then at the end of
every video, it's like, so, what decision will you make?
So we just we're not like, just say no to
drugs or just say no.
Speaker 1 (17:17):
To this or that didn't work.
Speaker 3 (17:19):
It's not morally you know, We're providing information so that
they can make educated decisions.
Speaker 1 (17:25):
So do you do the kids react to For instance,
we know that if they start smoking marijuana at a
young age, before they're in their early twenties, basically before
the brain is completely developed, right, that marijuana is literally
going to stunt the development of their brain. It's like
putting the brakes on it. It can and the more.
(17:46):
And if you smoke a lot of it, then your
brain just doesn't develop in some areas and then it's
too you know that, right, that's I think you're right.
Speaker 2 (17:54):
So that's what we do, is.
Speaker 3 (17:55):
We give them information that when you're smoking marijuana, your
frontal lobe turns off. It's off during that time of
being high, right, And so if you're getting high three
to four times a week and then it stops because
adolescence that's the time of frontal lobe development, you know,
from twelve to twenty four and twenty five years old.
(18:15):
And so if you spend your adolescence drunk or high,
then is that part of your brain is not developing.
And that's the part of your brain that helps you
to be successful in adulthood, that helps you to leave
your parents home and be able to manage a life
on your own, problem solving, decision making. And so our
(18:35):
goal is to educate kids about how these different things
affects them so that they know that because a lot
of people.
Speaker 2 (18:42):
Don't know that.
Speaker 1 (18:43):
And then you know, they're grown ups and they don't
have the psychological training, the life experience to deal with
all kinds of things, but also their ability to understand
how things work, and not just how things work, but
also how relationship with other people work. That's gone forever.
(19:03):
It becomes really difficult to modify that kind of behavior
if it hasn't been properly washed out.
Speaker 3 (19:11):
And research shows that ninety percent of adults that are
addicted to some kind of a substance started using when
they were teens. And so if we can at least
delay that use of those substances, you're right, there's a
higher likelihood that it won't develop into addiction.
Speaker 1 (19:29):
You're listening to Houston PA, Houston's Public Affairs show. My
name is Laurent. My guest is doctor Tandra Gordon. She
is a senior program director for brain Abouts. By the way,
she is a licensed marriage and family therapist, and she
was also a kindergarten teacher, so don't mess with her.
The people who developed the authority to control little people
(19:51):
are the most dangerous disciplinarians out there.
Speaker 3 (19:55):
So funny, it really is cool how life happens. Because
I started my careers in the elementary school team. Yeah,
and then I work for the Council and Recovery where
I work with substance abuse, and then I combined education
and therapy. In my work, I became vice president of
school based Health and oversalid school based health Clinics and
(20:16):
now get to combine all of that in the work
that I do at brain Abouts.
Speaker 2 (20:19):
It's really cool.
Speaker 1 (20:19):
You also worked with our friends at the Legacy Health
Clinics I did.
Speaker 2 (20:24):
Yeah, my friends.
Speaker 1 (20:26):
They used to be called the Montrose Clinic. For those
of us who have been around since the mid nineties,
that's how I found out about them. They used to
provide a free and anonymous age testing back in the
mid nineties. Such a rich history, rich history of doing
the right thing by people to keep them safe but
also out of trouble, because back then that kind of
(20:48):
testing could be the kind of news that might destroy
your family relationship. I think we're mostly long past that
from most of us, but they were one of the
great organizations that helped to move that forward by just
doing the right thing and then facilitized and then they
didn't try to indoctrinate eight people, just say we're making
this available, it's the right thing to do, it's safe,
(21:09):
you can get tested, and then you know, and then
you can stop the spread. And now we live in
a world where being diagnosed with HIV most likely will
not lead to AIDS. And it's not a it's not
at all. It's well, it's a great inconvenience, and it's
an inconvenience you've got to be really watchful about. But so,
(21:30):
good job, a nice career, I would say thus far.
Speaker 3 (21:34):
Yeah, when I started with the school based health program
at Legacy, there were seven clinics and one school system,
and I was oversaw the program. So it's growth to
thirty three clinics about across three school system thirty and
so I'm really proud of that work and I'm proud
that it continues, and I'm grateful for it. And that's
been my career, is just really being a part of
(21:56):
mission minded organizations that just want to help, and so
I'm grateful to be continuing that with Brainabouts.
Speaker 1 (22:03):
We should give out their website if you're interested in
getting more information about the Legacy Health Clinic. They're online
at Legacy Communityhealth dot org. Legacy Communityhealth dot org. I
would like to mention that you're being funded by the
John Fontaine Junior Charity, which was started by John Fontaine's
(22:25):
parents after John was killed in a car accident. You
explained to me that he was not the one driving.
He happens to be the victim of an accident which
was at least partially caused by a driver who was
highly inebriated.
Speaker 3 (22:42):
Yeah, so mission minor organizations. Brainabouts comes from a family
a tragedy. Jack Fontaine had been sober for many years, and.
Speaker 1 (22:56):
That's the dad, the dad, and.
Speaker 3 (22:58):
Then his son John, you know, was at a party.
He didn't know drinking, was Jack and Nancy didn't know drinking.
What's going on? But you know, John got into a
car with a friend that had been drinking, and within
minutes he would they got into an accident and John
was killed immediately. And within a month of mourning the
loss of their son, Jack and Nancy made a commitment
(23:21):
and a promise to John that they would do everything
that they could to reduce tragic phone calls, to reduce
other families from receiving a phone call like the one
that they received that night. And so that is where
brainabouts was birthed, is through a commitment to provide education.
Because you know, if you ever talk to Jack, he's like,
(23:42):
if one person at that party had said, no, not
get in that car, y'all.
Speaker 2 (23:47):
Have been drinking.
Speaker 3 (23:48):
And so that is what brain Abouts is is providing education,
providing conversations that people may not have without an intervention
like this.
Speaker 1 (24:00):
You're part of your programs that you're developing is a
new Tier three program. It's an intervention program that you're
doing an association with a professor Stanford University. This sounds
really cool, but that sounds like a big step forward.
In other words, your programs are developing and evolving.
Speaker 3 (24:16):
We are, I mean we are like always on the move,
and that's one mark of our program. It's really because
society is always on the move, and our commitment is
to keep up with where students are and meet them
where they are and give them what they need and.
Speaker 1 (24:30):
So and deal with the new addictions made available by
new technology.
Speaker 3 (24:34):
Right exactly exactly whatever's coming up, we're researching it and
creating information and education so that everybody knows about it
and it's how it's affecting them. So, yeah, we're very
excited about our Tier three program Brainabouts. Overall, it's focused
on prevention, but this program is going to be focused
on intervention with students that may had may have.
Speaker 2 (24:57):
Gotten in trouble at school.
Speaker 3 (24:58):
For you know, some type of high risk behavior or
maybe struggling with some type of high risk behavior. And
so it's based on the work of doctor Anna Link,
who is a Stanford professor, and she uses the acronym
dopamine as a source of an intervention. And so our
Tier three program is focused on that and we're really
(25:20):
excited about developing that this year.
Speaker 1 (25:22):
And when you mean Tier three, those are older kids.
Speaker 3 (25:25):
No, No, so Tier three. So in terms of school
Tier one we talk about we use that term when
we're talking about like every student in the school, you know,
and so prevention and then Tier three and Tier two
is kind of maybe a smaller group that you might
have small some type of small group intervention with them.
And then Tier three is kind of that one on
(25:46):
one you know, maybe they've gotten in trouble, they're really
struggling in some place, and so they need that one
on one intervention with a counselor. And what we're providing
is a tool for those counselors to use to intervene
with those students.
Speaker 1 (25:59):
And when you're using the word intervention, what you mean
is that a teacher or a counselor, as you mentioned,
will reach out to the students and make themselves available
to them, right.
Speaker 3 (26:09):
And so a lot of times when kids get in
trouble at school, there's just a consequence, right, Okay, you know,
you've got caught vaping in the restroom, so now you're
suspended or this or that.
Speaker 2 (26:20):
What we want to.
Speaker 3 (26:21):
Provide is a source of change, a source where they
can learn and grow from an experience and not just
be punished, but learn and possibly make different choices next time.
And so we want to meet kids where they are
and provide a place that allows them to make better choices.
Speaker 1 (26:44):
So an open door policy for all.
Speaker 3 (26:46):
Basically everybody has potential, and we want to help as
many kids that are willing to meet that potential.
Speaker 1 (26:55):
I think that it's extremely useful to have something like
bring Abouts in the school system because you can have
an open door policy, as I mentioned, But very often
the teenagers or the young kids that most need help
won't come through that door. They're not going to do
it voluntarily. Yeah, and it's maybe part because they don't
understand what that means. You don't know what's in their head,
(27:18):
and it's not hard to imagine that they will be
fearful of getting in trouble if they talk to anyone
about these problems. Yeah, So you're essentially sort of in
a blanketed kind of way, you're saying, hey, you know what,
if you're dealing with this, yes, that's not you don't
get in trouble for that.
Speaker 2 (27:35):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (27:36):
And if you never heard that before, it can be
an epiphany.
Speaker 3 (27:39):
Yes, And so like a brain about So our program
is designed so like we have videos on each one
of our topics, and so that video might be five
to seven minutes. Along with that is an activity guide
that fosters communication and discussion. And this is on the
prevention side with it between teacher and students, and and
(28:00):
then activities where the student might have like a journaling
activity or something to further think about or process or
internalize what they've learned from the video. And at the
end of every video is like, you know, this is
what it is, and if you're struggling with this, this
is what you can do.
Speaker 2 (28:17):
And so it creates.
Speaker 3 (28:21):
Education, you know, Like we talked about earlier, kids often
go through things, but they don't have the words to
articulate what they're going through, and then they don't know
what to do to help themselves with what they're going
through and so our goal is that all of these topics,
introducing these things to them will give them words for
what they're experiencing and an avenue to be able to
(28:43):
reach out for help. And we are a mission minded organization.
We're powered by the John Fontaine Junior Charity, and the
charity is very much focused on cost not being a
barrier to our program getting in schools and so.
Speaker 1 (28:58):
Well, I mean all your videos are free click whatever.
Speaker 3 (29:02):
Yeah, wherever you are, as far as you know a school,
whether your school has a big budget or small budget,
brain abouts istory you.
Speaker 1 (29:10):
It's awesome. It it sort of comes as a package
that works. All you have to do is turn it on,
so to speak. So just go to brainabouts dot org.
Brainabouts dot org. That's how you can find out how
the program works because you'll see and you'll get an
idea of how it works by watching it work. And
you can get in contact with them and start the
process of having them in your school or make sure
(29:33):
that your your your students can have access to it.
And as usual, if you have any questions related to Houston, PA,
you can just send me an email Texan from France
at gmail dot com and you'll get an answer, and
I want to thank you for caring about the issues
I put on this show. I'll be here at the
same time next week, and I thank you for listening. Folks.
My name is Laurent I am the Texan from France
(29:55):
and this has been Houston PA, Houston's public affairs show,
Houston Strong
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