Smoking affects everyone.
That was the message San Benito High School senior Victoria
Batres wanted to convey when she entered the Tobaction Club’s
poster contest in May. And, not only did Batres enter, the senior
took first place out of 18 entries for her poster depicting the
foot of an infant who’s mother smoked.
Smoking affects everyone.
That was the message San Benito High School senior Victoria Batres wanted to convey when she entered the Tobaction Club’s poster contest in May. And, not only did Batres enter, the senior took first place out of 18 entries for her poster depicting the foot of an infant who’s mother smoked.
Batres, who is taking advanced art, decided to use charcoal because everyone else was doing cartoons.
“I went into it thinking I’d get first place. I think I’m pretty good,” Batres said.
She received $100 for her effort while the second-place finisher earned $50, third $25 and fourth-place received $10.
The second-place winners were a sister act, juniors Sheilah and Sheryl Overman. Chantel Guajardo took third and John Dixon, a freshman, placed fourth.
The goal of the contest was to raise awareness about the effects of tobacco use – both smoking and chewing, said Andrew Prisco, Tobaction Club advisor and SBHS counselor.
“We wanted kids to come up with an anti-tobacco theme and illustrate it on a poster,” Prisco said.
Entries were judged by students, staff and the district superintendent during lunch time at the high school. The club also wants to publish prints of the winning posters and circulate them around campus and at other county schools, Prisco said.
None of the winners were Tobaction Club members, but they are interested in art and entering contests.
Art instructor John Robrock required that his students complete a poster, but didn’t make them enter them.
Dixon drew cigarettes coming out of cartoon SpongeBob SquarePants’ holes. The poster read “This just isn’t funny.”
“I like to draw and enter contests,” said Dixon, who is enrolled in Art I and II. “… I like cartooning. That’s what I’m best at.”
Sheilah Overman drew an old woman smoking with the message “Isn’t she lovely? Smoking took it’s toll.” Sheryl Overman’s poster read “Don’t become a NicoTeen” and had a drawing of a teenager with wrinkles and yellow, decaying teeth. Guajardo drew a close-up of the face of a smoker using greens, yellows and blues and wrote, “If you think smoking increases sex appeal, think again.”
The mission of Tobaction is to “educate students about the dangers of tobacco use and also to prevent students from using tobacco products in the first place,” Prisco said. Club members are required to be tobacco free. The club has about 20 members.
Members spread the message to middle-school students, serve as mentors at middle schools and they participated in a peer research review study with the University of California at San Francisco.
Prisco said he hoped to bring the club’s outreach program to elementary students as well as middle-school students.
“It’s extremely important to get the word out and to give kids accurate information about the consequences of tobacco use,” he said. “In middle school, I believe, kids start experimenting with cigarettes. By the time they reach high school, they’re already smoking, they’re already addicted.”
For more information on the Tobaction Club, call Prisco at 637-5831, ext. 114. The club will hold a car wash fundraiser Sunday at the medical offices on the corner of Memorial Drive and Sunnyslope Road starting at 10 a.m.
