Lions Quest Skills for Adolescence Programme in Serbia – Implementation results

The evidence-based drug use prevention programme “Lions Quest Skills for Adolescence”, targeting 10-14-year-old students, was first introduced to the South Eastern Europe (SEE) region in 2014 with the start of the pilot programme in Serbia. The first implementation cycle was running for a year, from June 2014 to July 2015, and focused primarily on schools in Belgrade, covering the City Municipality Zvezdara and the City Municipality Novi Beograd. In total, 75 teachers were trained on the nationally adapted programme who then delivered the “Lions Quest Skills for Adolescence” curriculum to over 1,300 students across 21 different schools. For this project, UNODC and the Lions Clubs International Foundation worked in close partnership with the Ministry of Education, Science and Technological Development of the Republic of Serbia.

The programme was monitored throughout implementation and rigorously evaluated upon completion, both to measure effectiveness and achieved outcomes, and to identify potential areas of improvement during the implementation process. Particularly positive outcomes of the programme were found to be the enhancement of students’ refusal skills, as well as statistically significant improvements of reported substance use and intended substance use.

Due to the success of the first implementation cycle of the programme, a second cycle of “Lions Quest Skills for Adolescence” is being implemented for additional 10 elementary schools in central Belgrade and the city’s outskirts, providing training to 19 teachers in the process. The expansion of the programme brought with it a slight modification in the implementation modality, drawing from lessons learned and feedback of the first cycle. It is now being implemented over the course of two academic years instead of one, with the expectation that due to the longer duration, teachers will be able to deliver more programme sessions, resulting in even better outcomes. 

In total, the programme has so far reached over 1,800 students in more than 30 schools across the Belgrade Municipalities Zvezdara, Novi Beograd, Mladenovac, Lazarevac, Palilula, and Zemun, with 94 trained teachers delivering the “Lions Quest Skills for Adolescence” programme.