The Pinecrest Pilots organization had quite a year, recently turning in three championship performances including one magnificent capper to the Pee Wee team's season. Pinecrest won the Florida Youth Football and Cheerleaders Association's Super Bowl title in the Mighty Mite, Super Midget and Pee Wee age groups. The Super Bowl games were played in Brandon in late November. ...more

December 24, 2008

The annual Florida Youth Substance Abuse Survey shows continuing declines in binge drinking, smoking - both tobacco and marijuana - and most other drug use. ...more

November 17, 2008

With two months gone in their youth football seasons, three southeast Hillsborough County teams are not showing any signs that they might lose. ...more

October 15, 2008

Local Church of the Nazarene members will join with all Church of the Nazarene followers tomorrow to celebrate the denomination's worldwide Centennial. One church is in Brooksville and two are in Spring Hill. ...more

October 4, 2008

SEBRING — Area high school students will encounter a new set of classes when they go back to school in August. The set of 12 classes will not be on social studies and math but alcohol prevention. The new program is being funded through a grant totaling more than $432,000 to prevent alcohol abuse among high school students in the Florida Heartland, a top local education official said Wednesday. Frank Gibbs, the executive director of the Heartland Education Consortium based in Lake Placid, said it would be up to the Highlands County School Board to determine how the courses will be inserted into the high school curriculum. ...more

June 11, 2008

The Lake Placid High School, through Melissa Sohns, student advisor, and coordinated with all local EMS and law enforcement, put on a realistic mock DUI car crash, which sent a chilling reminder of the ultimate danger of drinking and driving. However, the Highlands County Community Coalition for Substance Abuse Reduction (HCCC) would like to expand on the message given to the over 800 students, teachers and parents who attended. ...more

May 21, 2008

SEBRING — About 400 middle and high school students met regularly to plan activities on spreading the word about the dangers of tobacco and smoking. That was five years ago before a funding cut in 2003 severely curtailed, or at some schools ended the Students Working Against Tobacco (S.W.A.T.) program. With a federal grant to fund it, the Highlands County Health Department proposes to reinstitute the program in the county's high schools. Active S.W.A.T. membership in the county has dropped 70.8 percent since the year 2000, according Donna Noel Stayton, Health Department tobacco prevention specialist. About 28.1 percent of the high school students in Highlands County reported using tobacco within the last 30 days of taking the 2006 Florida Youth Tobacco Survey . ...more

January 22, 2008

Neither side won its opening match, but that didn't matter too much to the Tampa Barbarians and Pinellas Athletic Club after they played their first competitive matches in the Florida Youth Rugby Union North Division last Saturday. ...more

January 19, 2008

Neither side won its opening match, but that didn't matter too much to the Tampa Barbarians and Pinellas Athletic Club after they played their first competitive matches in the Florida Youth Rugby Union North Division last Saturday. ...more

January 19, 2008

Neither side won its opening match, but that didn't matter too much to the Tampa Barbarians and Pinellas Athletic Club after they played their first competitive matches in the Florida Youth Rugby Union North Division last Saturday. ...more

January 19, 2008