[Music] [Applause] [Music] uh hello everybody My name is Anandanda Lennox I'm the new director for the close community coalition of Long Meadow
Our mission is to try to reduce and delay youth substance use so that um the youth of Long Meadow can have the healthiest futures imaginable And today I am here with Nico Montoya who is a junior at Long Meadow High School and he is um one of the people who entered our PSA contest Um the topic is Natural High
which is a website that um has been around for a long time and what it does is it tries to promote like the positive things that people do that they feel passionate about And so today Nico's with me and unfortunately his partner Henry couldn't make it um but this was a team effort and they made a video um
together for this contest So I wanted to ask you first So you're a junior Um what grade is Henry in uh Henry is a senior He's a senior So he's going to be leaving us soon Um and he would have been here but he had tryyouts And Nico thank you so much for being here cuz I know you had to find somebody to pick up your siblings even to be here Um but my
first question for you is how did you um hear about the contest um so I first heard about the contest um when my communications teacher Miss Gross uh it was one of our assignments that we had in Google Classroom Um so throughout the year we had numerous uh video
assignments that we'd work on some of them as a group and some of them independently So this was one of the things that she encouraged us to take part in and I think she graded us too So nice Yeah So you got an opportunity to win a prize and also got a grade and had a teacher that was encouraging Yeah
that's awesome Yeah So um other than you've kind of already answered the question but like my second question for you is going to be like what made you decide to actually put an entry in and since it sounds like you kind of answered that question could you tell me maybe a little bit more about what inspired the topic of your video um yeah
sure So I think me and Henry were just sitting down at our desks and we're like what should we do for the video cuz it could have honestly been anything Um obviously like what makes us you know what's our natural high um but we both
connected on the same idea of music and that was something that we both are passionate about and that we have like an interest for Um so that's kind of how we got to decide the topic was just that it was a mutual interest between us and we kind of came up with some fun ideas
for it So we were able to like put those in the video um and also show like that that's something that we like to listen to and do So what was the inspiration between using the fake voice for Henry um so that was actually it wasn't going to be like that originally Um we were
just going to have like his his normal voice but we needed it to be under 30 seconds So we had to speed it up and because of that his voice ended up being like a lot higher So yeah Excellent It ended up it it kind of added a humorous element to it that I think helped you guys in the long run So I think that was
a good choice Um thank you Oh I know The final thing was just sort of like was it fun to make oh yeah definitely Um we just went inside a classroom that was right next to where we usually go and got together some props and it was really fun Uh we just kind of uh threw
out all of our ideas that we were having uh when we were talking about it in the class and then started filming it and yeah so there was some stupid stuff obviously in the video um you've seen it but it was just really fun uh overall and I feel like it uh allowed me to kind
of greater understand like oh this is actually like helpful for me like listening to music and it's like uh and we also like had this stat in it or whatever uh the statistics So I feel like that was just kind of uh helped me out to understand more like this is like
how music helps me not just like to have fun um recording a video with your friends like but really on a deeper level It's like it helps you out you know and that's like the whole point of the contest So it was cool for sure Yeah it was really well done So congratulations I have a gift card for
you from Batch Ice Cream You guys won third place Um it was a stiff competition so this is hard earned So I want to present that to you today Oh wow Thank you so much And thank you so much for coming on Um we're gonna take a minute now to actually watch Henry and Nico's um video on his natural high
which is music Mhm I hope you guys enjoy Oh my god my life is just so miserable Like I hate I hate everything Like let me let me throw on my earpods Let's see Let's see what happens [Music]
Wow I I really needed that That was great man This This is how I know music is my natural high I wonder if uh other people can relate Oh yeah It says right here "Listening to relaxing music significantly reduces stress levels with participants reporting a 61% reduction in anxiety." All right Now I'm here with our second
place winners We have Audrey Kimell and Angelina 2 who are pretty good friends and not surprisingly did a PSA on friendship Um so same questions as I asked our third place winner Can you please tell me like what um how did you hear about the contest so we were
actually in the same class as Ano So we heard about it through Miss Gross the communications teacher and it was during winter and it was an assignment Yeah and we were just told to submit it and like see where things go I don't think we
really expected to like place anything but um it was honestly a surprise but I'm glad we did That's awesome Now uh remind me what grade are you in i'm a senior You're a senior And I'm a junior Junior Okay And are you as good a friends as you seem to be on the video
yes Yeah Yeah It was very like candid Yeah Um and we are going to show it at the end of this clip but it is it's very cute how you guys connect over that video Um the other thing I wanted to ask you is so Miss it was Mrs Gross who introduced it to you Um what made you
actually decide to enter the contest um well she said that there would be a reward So we were trying to just like see maybe Yeah It was just like um like why not yeah And how big of an undertaking was
it like did it take you a long time to come up with a video no No We actually didn't know what to do so we just like and then we started laughing about something like "Oh we should just do this." Because we didn't really understand the assignment at first like natural high like what can we even do for that
And that's good feedback for us to hear cuz it means when we advertise it again we should probably make it a little bit more clear cuz the whole point of the contest is natural high is just sort of like what do you what are you drawn to what do you feel passionate about that when you do it you feel good about it And sometimes people think it has to be this big thing but as you guys like
demonstrated so well hanging out with friends is one of them you know and as Nico did it's listening to music Like those are the things that you come back to over and over again So that's why we chose your video as a second place winner Um the other thing I wanted to ask you before we go is um did you have
fun making it yes we had a lot of fun Like all the laughs that you see were real Yeah Like we were just sitting there together just talking Yeah I think we recorded ourselves for like just 8 minutes straight and just kind of cut out the parts Yeah Like to make it um fit the requirements of 30 seconds Yeah
And then was it hard um the other part of the contest was like find a statistic that backs up what you're making your video about Was that difficult to do or No we kind of decide on what to make the video about and then after we made it I just Googled like I was like "Oh this like fits the theme." And you're right
You're right Yeah like having friends like people that you can rely on and people who like stand up for you is like one of the biggest protective factors that keep people like you know tied into the goals and the things that they want out of life So so congratulations you two Yeah And now we're going to get a moment to see your PSA Thank you
[Music] So without uh further ado we are now sitting down with Ava Collins who is our first place winner of the Natural High PSA contest Congratulations Ava Thank
you How did you hear about the contest um I heard about it from my teacher Miss Gross but I've also heard about it from the TVs around the school and it was an assignment for us So um I submitted my video Nice Nice And what was it that um
inspired you to choose the topic that you chose cuz from what I learned from talking to you offcreen it's something that you've been involved in for a long time Um I chose cheer because it has a big impact on my life I've been doing it for 10 years and I wanted to show the
viewers or audience who are watching it um that you can do like a sport or exercising and it can really make you focused and change your mind off the negative things like choosing sports over alcohol
Nice Was it fun to make and did it take a lot of time to put it together um it was really fun to make because I love trailing I make a lot of videos about it and it didn't take that long to make Probably only like 20 minutes or so That's not bad
Yeah And the footage of all the cheering were you in them like cuz I didn't I'm only meeting you really today So is that footage of you yeah All those videos are me at my competitions So I'm in it competing and the videos are from like it's on varsity
TV So those are where I got the videos from Nice And you're a senior right And you're planning on going to college next year How is cheer going to fit in once you're in college um so I also plan on doing um Allstar Cheer which is what you
see in the videos That's called Allstar Cheerleading and I do at Northstar Athletics So I'm going to plan on doing that again next year Since I'm staying local I'm just going to do it there but I'm also going to do it at Western New England which is the college I'm going
to Well congratulations again It was a really well done video It was so nice to have somebody who showed such a great example of like what a natural high looks like and what a passion really looks like that's good for you Um so we're going to take a moment now to be able to watch her video on Shear And
before we do that I also wanted to just say um thank you everybody for joining us It's been really nice to meet the students who put all the work into these PSAs and um have a moment to just acknowledge all of your hard work and accomplishment Thank you so much Thank you Thank you so much You're
[Music] welcome [Music] Heat Heat [Music]
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