Youth Gambling Awareness Program
The YMCA Youth Gambling Awareness Program (YGAP) is a free service funded by the Government of Ontario offering educational prevention programs to youth and adults involved in young people’s lives on gambling awareness including potential risks, making informed decisions and healthy and active living.
Prevention begins with awareness
YGAP provides a multi-faceted and innovative approach to problem gambling prevention through outreach, community education, and community awareness activities like community involvement events and youth engagement projects.
YGAP’s work in the community includes a variety of tools fitting the needs of individuals and communities:
Beyond Betting Audio Series
The "Beyond Betting" audio series tackles the topic of player packs in video games such as Madden, Fifa, NBA 2K. Player packs are an in-game feature added to game modes in some video games. Player pack openings are completely random and include an element of risk when using real money or in-game currency to purchase them. The first installment in the series features harm reduction strategies and real-world advice for people playing these types of video games.
Locations
Book a free interactive awareness-raising workshop today!
YGAP workshop options include a variety of offerings to align with the mandate of the gambling education and prevention. The common denominator amongst these tools is the fluidity of the content, always improving to stay relevant and up to date.
Want to be more involved?
In addition to awareness raising workshops, YGAP provides other opportunities for youth and community members to become more involved by offering:
Why Talk to Youth About Gambling?
- Gambling patterns start as early as 8 years of age and can be established before adolescence.
- Children and adolescents commonly engage in legalized and self-organized gambling activities at home and in school.
- The earlier people start to gamble, the more likely it is to be an issue later on.
- Although problem gambling has been primarily thought of as an adult behaviour, gambling activities appear to be particularly attractive to today's youth. In fact, prevalence studies conducted in the United States, Canada, New Zealand, Europe, and Australia have noted rising prevalence rates of youth involvement in both legal and illegal forms of gambling.
- According to a study by researchers from the Centre for Addiction and Mental Health (CAMH) and the University of Waterloo, 42 per cent of all adolescents surveyed reported that they had gambled money or something of value. Popular gambling activities included: a dare or challenge (22 per cent), instant-win or scratch tickets (14 per cent), games of skill, such as pool or darts (12 per cent), offline sports pools (9 per cent), and cards, such as poker and black jack (9 per cent).Technology has made gambling accessible to youth everywhere
- Nearly 10 per cent of teens said they had gambled online in the past three months.
- 36 per cent of online gambling teens had a score indicating a potential problem (versus eight per cent for offline gamblers).
- Youth need to understand and know their choices before facing risky situations.
- Gambling problem prevalence among youth is 2-4 times higher than the adult population.
- Youth with gambling problems tend to report higher rates of substance abuse, depression, anxiety, and suicide.
- Suicide attempts for individuals impacted by problem gambling occur at twice the rate of other addictions.
Need More Information?
For more information, please click here. Download the YGAP program brochure. (PDF). To learn more about YMCA Youth programs call 416-928-9622 or 1-800-223-8024 or contact us at memberservices@ymcagta.org
Additional Resources
Additional Resources
Teen Nights
