Addressing Youth Vaping: Building Capacity, Not Dependency

The work of delaying and preventing youth substance use will not be won by outsiders. The answers already live inside schools.

A week ago, we launched the Addressing Youth Vaping in Schools professional learning series in Toronto with a clear purpose: to equip educators with practical tools that match the world they walk through every morning. To build capability that lasts. To strengthen the relationships that already protect students.

This is a subtractive approach. Remove confusion. Remove isolation. Remove the belief that someone else must come in and fix things. Capacity doesn’t fall from the sky—it grows where students already feel seen and supported.

The pressures in public education are real. Resources are tight. Expectations climb higher every year. In that reality, the notion that solutions will always come from somewhere else is a promise schools cannot afford, and the evidence does not support. Sustainable progress depends on building skill, clarity and confidence inside the system itself.

Educators know their students. They understand the complex swirl of relationships, identity and stress that can lead a young person toward vaping. When they have the knowledge and permission to act early, they can change the trajectory of a student’s day and sometimes their future.

Toronto is only the beginning. Seven sites. Seven opportunities to create local expertise and local action. Everywhere we go, the same truth rises: strengthen the people who already care. Provide tools that respect the operational reality of schools. Trust the power of relationships.

Youth deserve environments that protect their well-being. Schools deserve support that endures long after the workshop ends.

That’s why we’re here. That’s why we’ll keep going.

Our next stop will offer support to our French-language K–12 system.

À bientôt, Ottawa!

Register for a conference near you at vapinginschools.ca.

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