Red Lake High School holds first Kick Butts Day

By Molly Miron

Pioneer Editor

      Red Lake High School organized a SWAT team - Students Working Against Tobacco - to commemorate national Kick Butts Day Wednesday, March 31, 2004.

   With the sponsorship of the Red Lake Tribal Council and high school administration, Nicole Beaulieu, Red Lake Tobacco Prevention Coordinator, and the Student Council spent the day discussing the harmful aspects of smoking.

   Vernelle Lussier, student council president, explained that they were not talking about tobacco used in traditional spirituality. They were campaigning against the use of cigarettes and other forms of recreational, commercial tobacco.

   “Asema means tobacco, which is sacred,” she said. “It’s used during ceremonies. That’s the way it should be used.”

   The students and their advisers handed out lollipops with the international “No Smoking” symbol to indicate that smokers are suckers. They set up displays and a graffiti wall where students and teachers wrote anti-smoking messages. They also put on memorial badges to honor family and friends who have died or become ill from using tobacco.

   Some smokers quit for the day, and Beaulieu said she hopes the students’ energy will carry the campaign along into the future.

   “Kick Butt Day doesn’t just stop on March 31,” she said. “I though this was a good idea to bring to the high school because when I was here, there was no prevention program.”

   Beaulieu’s memorial badge named her great-grandmother, Olive Neadeau, and grandmother, Elaine Donelle, both of whom died from tobacco-related diseases.

   Beaulieu’s mother, Cheryl Schoenborn, who has been a non-smoker for three years, also helped with the campaign.

   “This is so important to me. I lost my mom in 2001 to lung cancer. I don’t want to put my kids through that,” she said.

   Challenge Johnson wore a badge in memory of his uncle, Melvin Bedeau, and a good friend, Lee Lussier Sr.

   “He was a really good friend,” Johnson said. “He smoked for 55 years.”

   Johnson wrote on the graffiti wall: “Smoking took away one of the coolest old guys I ever knew.”

   Vernelle wore a badge to honor her grandfather and hero, Clarence Sonny Stately, who is in chemotherapy for cancer.

   “To my grandpa, I want to say stay strong. You’re helping us stay strong with you, and we love you a lot,” she said.

   Connie Jorgensen, community health director, said the Red Lake Hospital staff members deal with many tobacco-related diseases in children and adults, including asthma and lung cancer. In addition, she said smoking makes underlying problems, such as diabetes, worse.

   Vernelle and other SWAT team members estimated that 70 percent of Red Lake High School students smoke.

   Jo Cobenais said, “I just think to myself, ‘Why do you have to light that up?’ and roll down my window.”

   Challenge, No. 22 on the Red Lake Ogichidaag basketball team, said students who smoke know enough not to offer him cigarettes.

   The students plan to take their displays to the Red Lake Middle School and Elementary School.

   Oran Beaulieu said the Red Lake Hospital sponsors smoking cessation courses and the Tribal Council has banned smoking in government buildings. Now, the sign at the entrance to tribal headquarters “Smoking permitted in authorized areas only” has a diagonal “No Smoking” sticker pasted across it.