“I brought Tony Hoffman in to a small county in Northern Wisconsin to speak at all three of our counties school districts and his message exceeded my expectations. By sharing his powerful story he was able to paint a picture of the addiction process in a way that youth could really understand. His message had layers of depth beyond substance abuse, his message incorporated dealing with depression and anxiety and encouraged kids to seek help and support for the internal conflicts that they deal with. He encouraged the kids to find their gift and never put it away, to work hard in life, to keep a positive attitude and to really put thought into the choices they make. I believe his message had great impact on our youth and that they walked away feeling empowered, hopeful, educated and more confident to say no to drugs and alcohol. I received wonderful feedback from faculty at all three school districts and would highly recommend him to anyone wanting to get a similar message across to the youth in their communities.”
I grew up in the small town of Clovis, California. Our population when I went to high school was roughly 40,000 people. Most places in California would consider that a very small town. Winters, Wisconsin population is 256, yes 256! Now that is small, I can only imagine that everyone knows everyone! There is only a few small stores and things there plus the schools. Most certainly not a bad thing but boy is that a different way of life!
When talking to the principal I was told there would be about 100 students and that was their 7-12 graders. My first question was, what do you guys do for sports? He replied, “We play 8 man football,” I’ve never even heard of that until now! Not only that! They travel two hours to play other schools… HOLY COW! That’s dedication! It was 80’s week on campus as they were preparing for their home coming week, the students were dressed up in their appropriate 80’s attire for my presentation.
This was a presentation in a small auditorium that didn’t require a mic. The students were extremely respectful as you would expect in a very small location such as this. They had some very good questions and a few of them reached out to me afterward via instagram. I wasn’t expecting a huge influx from instagram in this location, I didn’t even have cell phone service for most of this area! Back at the hotel was like the only place I had cell service. This is definitely a place i’m going to remember forever, so unique! Thank you LCO for making this one possible!
