(16.10.2008) 437 students at a videregående skole in Skien participated at the Stopp Volden-campaign in Telemark last week. The response was very positive from all the participants.

It was a Thursday morning on the 2nd of October when the Skien Red Cross Youth paid a visit to Hjalmar Johansen videregående skole. The sky was very clear and showed no signs of rainfall. When they arrived at the school, two staff members were waiting to receive them, and welcomed them with respect and optimism.
The facilitators of the campaign organized the hall by placing in the materials to use in their right order and exact place and divided the whole group into three parts. At the same time, one of the staff members left the room to different classes to inform the class teachers about the starting time. Postures were glued on the walls and colors were mixed by the facilitators for the palm prints.

The first group that came was from the Gymnastic class. They were very active in asking questions and taking part in different role plays. After an introduction part about the Red Cross, the group was led to the next room where they were supposed to put their palm print on a long piece of white cloth. Four by four, the group carried out the activity with excited faces.

The second group was from the media class. They participated with a lot of eagerness! Some of them even stood up and gave their opinions about violence and its consequences. After that, they were also led through the same procedures like the first group.

The final group from Industrial production came with a positive attitude as well. They were all given stickers for the campaign. All the three groups participated with joy and some were putting paint on their jeans!
Finally, the facilitators cleaned up the hall and had an evaluation.After the evaluation they left the school after they had all agreed that the campaign was successful.