Who We Are

WeldWAITS is an innovative healthy dating and relationship education program housed at the Weld County Department of Public Health and Environment.  It is a program that emphasizes optimal health promotion and negative consequence prevention through a sexual risk avoidance approach.  This approach empowers teenagers to make the healthiest choices when it comes to negative risky behaviors, including teen sex and dating violence.  It is a population-wide, primary prevention approach that aligns with other public health models.  The ultimate goal is to eliminate the high risk behaviors and the negative consequences that may occur as a result of engaging in the risky behavior.  

The primary goal of WeldWAITS is to increase the proportion of youth in Weld County voluntarily postponing sexual activity to prevent teen pregnancy, STIs, and additional negative outcomes by providing education and skills that empower youth to make informed and thoughtful decisions for optimal health and to avoid high-risk behaviors (including sexual activity, dating violence, substance use, etc.).  WeldWAITS  incorporates a community saturation approach to target the complex and multifaceted issues involved with high-risk behaviors among teenagers. The main areas of focus are:            

• Education
  • School-Based and community presentations for youth
  • Parent Education, including Platicas (Latino parenting education)
  • Individualized Education 
• Service-Learning Project
  • RESIST (after-school program in which high school students prepare younger students for the transition into middle school)
• Community Partnerships
  • Events (in collaboration with community partners)
  • Meeting teenagers where they are