New program provides parents and caregivers with practical tools to support conversations about alcohol while offering classroom resources for high school educators
WASHINGTON, D.C. (August 13, 2026)—Responsibility.org today announced the launch of Responsible Teens: Alcohol Education for High Schoolers, a new underage drinking prevention program designed to help parents and caregivers guide teens toward safe choices during their high school years. The program provides families with practical, research-informed resources to support ongoing conversations about alcohol, peer pressure, teen driver safety, and responsible decision-making. The program also includes flexible classroom lessons and educational materials for high school educators.
Lifetime consumption among teens is at record low levels, yet recent national data shows a slowing long-term decline in underage drinking. While progress is being made, underage drinking remains a concern. Early and continued engagement from parents and other trusted adults is critical to sustaining progress.
“Parents remain the leading influence on a teen’s decisions about drinking—or not drinking—alcohol,” said Leslie Kimball, Executive Director at Responsibility.org. “Each conversation is an opportunity to help your teenager make a better decision, stay safe, and empower their choices. Modeling responsible behaviors reinforces these conversations and helps teens become the best versions of themselves.”
Responsible Teens was developed alongside subject matter experts and educators from across the United States to provide skills- and fact-based information to fill a critical gap in alcohol education resources for families of high school students. The program is adaptable to diverse classroom settings and incorporates evidence-informed prevention practices including:
- Teaching social resistance skills to help students recognize and navigate peer pressure;
- Providing normative education to correct misconceptions about substance use;
- Using competence enhancement strategies to build essential life skills, such as decision-making and coping.
Materials for the program were created with guidance from Responsibility.org’s Educational Advisory Board, high school educators, and educational consultants using data and research from the National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism (NIAAA), the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration (SAMHSA), and the annual Monitoring the Future survey.
“Today’s teens are smart, and they recognize that underage drinking is not a rite of passage. That is a success story worth celebrating, but our work is not done” said Erin O’Malley, Upper School Counselor at the Holton-Arms School in Bethesda, MD. “High school students are facing new situations and new pressures every day. Responsible Teens provides families with practical, age-appropriate information and resources that make important conversations easier to start and more meaningful to continue. These conversations can have a lasting impact on teen health, safety, and decision-making.”
The Responsible Teens program materials for students and educators will be distributed through long standing partnerships with education-focused organizations such as SHAPE America, Discovery Education, and Classroom Champions, and to coalitions focused on teen wellness and success. All of the resources are cost-free and available on ResponsibleTeens.org as well as on high-traffic educator platforms such as Share My Lesson, Kahoot!, Teachers Pay Teachers, and PLT4M.
Research consistently shows that ongoing communication between parents and teens can play a powerful role in preventing underage drinking. By combining family engagement with evidence-based educational resources, Responsible Teens aims to help young people build the knowledge, confidence, and decision-making skills they need to make healthy choices throughout high school and beyond.
Responsible Teens builds upon Responsibility.org’s longstanding commitment to underage drinking prevention and serves as the bridge between the longstanding middle school prevention program, Ask, Listen, Learn, and its college-focused alcohol education initiatives, Alcohol 101+ for colleges and universities to use with students and Parents You’re Not Done Yet, a parenting resource for post-high school young adults. Responsibility.org also oversees the nationwide We Don’t Serve Teens campaign, a collective of more than 1600 individuals representing community partners from across the country committed to preventing the sale and service to anyone under the legal drinking age. These initiatives reinforce a simple but important message: most teens do not drink alcohol, and together, parents, educators, and communities can help keep it that way.
For more information and to access free family and educator resources, visit ResponsibleTeens.org.
