Finally an organization to present all the right things bass fishing has to offer to the angler,our prosperity and the environment ! This forum is being provided to you, the fisherman, to share the comaraderie found from within angling groups, to the local youth in which we reside.
If your interests have directed you this far, you undoubtedly have been fourtunate enough to have had that one person who took you fishing the very first time. Now you have aged, interests have grown and you find yourself always searching for that moment in time when the rod bends and your heart races! If you can understand this - read on!
"Hooked on Fishing...not on Drugs" is a national program provided through the Future Fisherman Foundation. The FFF coordinates and sponsors the program, funded primarily through tackle manufacturers and grants of the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service. In Ohio, the Division of Wildlife further promotes HOFNOD to eligible educators throughout the state, who in turn utilize the program to specific needs of their individualized local groups. This local adaptation is provided through educational materials and equipment from The Ohio Division of Wildlife, as well as the financial assistance of Ohio juvenile justice grants focusing on alternatives to delinquency and incarceration of youth.
The Portage County Juvenile Court has provided me this local forum to educate and involve our youth with all the positive aspects fishing can offer. A goal of HOFNOD is to empower parents with the knowledge that close knit family support can curtail their children's desire to use drugs. The program is used as a catalyst to bring parents and children in touch with one another through fishing.
Activities which provide recognition, one-on-one relationships, and adventurous leisure are effective in changing behaviors. This program can do all of that and more !!!!!
The program offers students positive choices for living and options to overcome problems.The wider perspective of prevention that HOFNOD incorporates is responsibility: individual,civic and environmental.
HOFNOD provides students activities that address thinking about their future and the community which they reside. By aligning a multitude of constituencies with the program, we too as a community share in our responsibilities to promote drug free lifestyles and in turn, create a sense of community which they may not regularly experience.
Emphasis is placed on our fragile environmental resources and the role prosperity will play in determining it's existence.
This series is being provided solely by FBFP2002, as one element of the work that is done with these kids. All students will have attended an aquatic educational event as well as going fishing from the bank at some point in time. Their role at FBFP2002 will be to learn what goes on at a bass tournament weigh-in, observe the ethics of sportsmanlike angling conduct and catch and release ( please allow them to help release, if it be the case!), and being provided with a "seminar" if you will- of the top three anglers of the event. This is your chance to shine as a bass fisherman, please make the most of it for yourself !
Please keep in mind the levels of fishing experience has ranged from none, to being the first mate on a charter. Some will be enthusiastic, some would rather be playing Sony playstation ! All we can do is be on our best behavior and show them what the sport has to offer. Freewill is a part of us all, and you will NOT change that in a teenager in half of an hour !
Under no circumstances are you to offer (or ask for) "guided" trips out fishing, phone numbers, addresses, etc. For the sake of liability and my program, I also request there be a "hands off" interaction regardless if it is a well intended pat on the back. After all that is discussed above I can see where this may be hard to understand, please leave the other work to me though ! If this is done right, the power of our angling spirit will make more of a difference than anything else.
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