Collegian.com
Thursday, November 7, 2019
Vol. 129, No. 25
The Backstage Van offers new take on photography Local creative takes multidimensional approach to music and art
By Joel Thompson @probably_joel
The National Institute of Drug Abuse has given a $3.2 million grant to researchers from Colorado State University and the University of Tennessee Knoxville to test a text-delivered counseling program for young adults with cannabis use disorder. PHOTO ILLUSTRATION BY COLIN SHEPHERD THE COLLEGIAN
Text-based cannabis counseling study could help student addicts By Ceci Taylor @cecelia_twt
Since Colorado legalized the recreational use of cannabis in 2014, Colorado’s “stoner culture” has skyrocketed, leading to marijuana tourist guides, a 420 festival and more. However, some researchers have found marijuana to be addicting and detrimental
to health. To help college-aged students who might struggle with cannabis addiction, Colorado State University researcher Doug Coatsworth has partnered with the University of Tennessee Knoxville’s Michael Mason to develop a text-based counseling system. “The study is intended to reach out to college-aged people — they don’t have to be students
here — who are using marijuana at levels they’re not really comfortable with,” Coatsworth said. “They may want to change, they don’t really know exactly how to change and maybe they don’t really want to go to counseling.” Coatsworth said the study is only beginning, and CSU plans to do a preliminary study where it will recruit some students to simply give information on their
patterns of cannabis use, but the study will officially start in the spring. The students who are recruited into the official study will receive around four texts per day over the course of five weeks, Coatsworth said. These texts are intended to help individuals make changes in their lives around reducing cannabis use. see CANNABIS on page 4 >>
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To call The Backstage Van a passion project would be an understatement. It’s the concept of freelance journalist, photographer and podcast host Johnny Leftwich, who combines multiple aspects of music media in a traveling van. The Backstage Van is part passion project and part livelihood of Leftwich. The project attempts to combine multiple aspects of music journalism into one efficient machine. “I got the van, I got the camera, I got the podcast equipment and I just started doing it,” Leftwich said. “Now I’m here.” The van itself is currently under construction by Leftwich and freelance designer Stephen Webb. Despite being unfinished, the project is still active. “I took on a lot,” Leftwich said. “I wouldn’t say I bit off more than I could chew because I’m definitely chewing it; I just have to figure out how to piece it together. But I didn’t want to lean on not finishing the van as an excuse not to start the project, so I started interviewing people.”
see BACKSTAGE on page 19 >>
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