Making it in the MilLife

Do you have a cyber-savvy teenager?

Teen to Extreme (T2X), is a brand new health literacy program being offered to teen agers aged 13-17 nationwide.

The T2X project was created as a result of a partnership with Health Net, UCLA School of Public Health, and EPG Technologies.

Health Net Federal Services is making a concentrated effort to reach out to teens of military families.

“It’s tough being a teenager today. It can be even tougher for those in military families, as they face unique challenges when a parent or loved one serves and is deployed and redeployed. The T2X program is a cutting-edge tool for teens to not only find support through the emotional cycles of deployment but also find the information to help them live a healthy and fulfilling life,” said Tom Carrato, president of Health Net Federal Services. “T2X empowers teens to take responsibility and become invested in their own health care and well-being.”

T2X is a teen only-community of users, with teen and professionally produced content, blogs, video sharing and other interactive media.

On T2X, teens will be able to find information on lifestyle issues such as nutrition, fitness, stress management and substance abuse.

Teens will be able to chat on line with health experts and ask questions, text key words to a designated number and receive customized content back to their mobile devices, participate in health oriented social networking through blogs, videos, and other transmedia tools.

The mission of T2X is to see teens become actively engaged in their health care and to promote health behaviors.

Parents and teen-check it out and tell us what you think.

Military OneSource is hosting a webinar, Choosing an Exceptional Life: Family-Directed Resource Organizations, on Wednesday, January 11, 2012, at 1:00 PM, EST. This webinar is the first in a three-part series, presented by Dr. Ann Turnbull. Visit Military One Source for details!

As the parent of a son with significant disabilities, Ann Turnbull will share some of her own family stories of the tremendous payoffs that can result from investing time to find the right resources for families with special needs. She will review some common quality-of-life issues and help participants identify their own family-life priorities. Ann will also highlight three national family organizations that provide family-directed services, in which experienced families support families facing specific special needs challenges for the first time. The first in a three-part series, this one-hour webinar includes a fifteen-minute question-and-answer period after the presentation.  Email Ann with your questions before the webinar by clicking here. Register for the webinar by clicking here.

About the presenter: Dr. Turnbull has an Ed.D. in Special Education–Mental Retardation and is a professor at the University of Kansas in the field of special education with expertise in special needs/disability, family support, family quality of life, and family-professional partnerships. She is the Co-Founder and Co-Director for the Beach Center on Disability, where she oversees research and development on a wide range of disability-related topics including family support, public policy, self-determination, assistive technology, early intervention, transition to adulthood, positive behavior support, and school reform.