As if I needed another worry
-
- August
- 16
Pulled this off the wire. Talk about fueling the fears about my boy growing up. Or is this just alarmist?
WASHINGTON, DC  Eleven million high school students (80 percent) and five million middle school students (44 percent) attend drug-infested schools, meaning that they have personally witnessed illegal drug use, illegal drug dealing, illegal drug possession, students drunk and/or students high on the grounds of their school according to the “National Survey of American Attitudes on Substance Abuse XII: Teens and Parents,� the twelfth annual back-to-school survey conducted by The National Center on Addiction and Substance Abuse (CASA) at Columbia University.
For the first time, this year CASA sought to survey in depth the drug situation in America’s schools. The survey revealed that at least once a week on their school grounds, 31 percent of high school students (more than four million) and nine percent of middle school students (more than one million) see illegal drugs used, sold, students high and/or students drunk. At least weekly, 17 percent of all high and middle school students (4.4 million) personally see classmates high on drugs at school.
“This fall more than 16 million teens will return to middle and high schools where drug dealing, possession, use and students high on alcohol or drugs are part of the fabric of their school,� said Joseph A. Califano, Jr., CASA’s chairman and president and former U.S. Secretary of Health, Education, and Welfare. “Too many of our nation’s high and middle schools have become marijuana marts and pill palaces. Parents should wake up to this reality and realize more likely than not, your teen is going to school each day in a building where drug use, sale and possession is as much a part of the curriculum as math or English and do something about it. For many of our middle and high school students, school days have become school daze.�
The CASA survey also found that since 2002 the proportion of students who attend schools where drugs are used, kept or sold has jumped 39 percent forhigh school students and 63 percent for middle school students. From 2006 to 2007, the proportion jumped 20 percent for high school students and 35 percent for middle school students. Other numbers:
• Compared to teens at drug-free schools, teens at drug-infested schools are:
 16 times likelier to use an illegal drug other than marijuana or prescription drugs;
 15 times likelier to abuse prescription drugs;
 six times likelier to get drunk at least monthly;
 five times likelier to use marijuana;
 four times likelier to smoke cigarettes;
 four times likelier to be able to buy marijuana within a day; and
 nearly six times likelier to be able to buy marijuana within an hour.
This entry was posted
on Thursday, August 16th, 2007 at 12:23 pm by Jorge Fitz-Gibbon.
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Jorge, calm down and breath – the world has been dangerous since he was born, you’re just seeing it with different eyes. These enemies have always been here – we’ve navigated this nightmare and do constantly. You can drive yourself nuts with worry and whatever you’re worrying about won’t be the thing that causes the problem.
Teach self-efficacy here – educate your son, expose him to drugs, go talk to the juvenille youth officer with him, just be constantly aware of what he’s doing and what his friends are doing and be sure you drill in the consequences of bad decisions until he can spew them back verbatim. It’s all about damage control, trying to be sure that whatever they do doesn’t cause permanent bodily injury or personal liability limiting their life choices. It’s that fine line of parent vs. friend and he needs the parent.
You’re the best example for him – how do you handle stress? how do you drink? smoke? handle relationships? You have to show up at parties unexpectedly, make rules that are fast in stone, let him make choices and talk about them and pray like hell. When you feel this way sit him down and talk with him about how you feel and how he feels – talk talk talk and talk. Teach him how to make choices and deal with the fallout.
It goes by so fast Jorge. One day they’re 17 and you have clout in their lives and the next day they’re 18 and all rules change. You can’t legally save them if they break the law, you can’t talk to their doctors from one day to the next because they’re adults, and they dont’ have to listen to you – they can move out and move away and put you out of their life—unless you’ve created a sound relationship and they want you in their lives. I guess what I’m trying to say is we don’t always have tomorrow to say something we’re feeling or worrying about – take advantage of the moment and share everything with him, your fears, your experience, your support. That’s all we can do – and pray.
This is definately alarmist. Trying to generalize to the entire population of millions of students regardless of location/region or other potential environmental influence based on the unconfirmable statements of just over 1000 people is kinda hard to get past. But, the claim that the number of students seeing drugs as a problem is a good thing. They are seeing drugs as a problem rather than harmless entertainment. On the otherhand, the source of the info is not verifiable along lines of accuracy or validity so it mostly means nothing…or it only could mean what the researchers are claiming IF their data happens to be true.
BTW – the data from the parents is highly suspect since parents rarely know much more than their children let them know. Plus, their opinions will be formed by assumption more than first hand knowledge….unless they are the ones getting their kids into drugs.
Rob, it’s so true, for me, that I didn’t know what was going on even though I worked in the schools. Many of the kids that I thought were good weren’t and there was more drinking and drugs going on on the high school grounds than the teachers or parents knew – and I found out because my kids told me; then their friends told me. Talking to the kids is so important and I think taking the classes offered in drug education is great too so parents know what to look for – example, kids taking non-prescription medicines or getting high on household cleaners. I was so ignorant of all of the kinds of ways kids were getting high. My children were the best educators.
Jorge, I think that the way a lot of these surveys are presented is deeply flawed.
There is no such thing as a drug-free school. Some schools have more drugs than others, but the whole drug problem knows no real economic boundaries.
Anecdotally, I have found that kids from more drug-infested neighborhoods tend to go to one extreme or another. Many kids from those neighborhoods won’t touch drugs at all. It’s as if they know they don’t have a margin for error.
Meanwhile, kids from more placid suburban neighborhoods seem more likely to dabble in drugs and then move on at some point. They seem to have a greater margin for error to dabble in drugs without their lives being devastated. Maybe the absence of violence around the drug trade in the suburbs makes the difference.
I think Gina is right. Dangers have always been there, and will always be. Your son will be offered drugs, as well as the opportunity to do a lot of other bad things. The most you can do is teach him to make the right choices, and to believe in himself sufficiently that he can stick to those choices in the face of pressures from his friends and classmates to do otherwise. Know the whole ‘scene;’ that’s something many parents don’t take the time to learn. Keep communication open, be vigilant, know the signs of what to look for, and don’t panic. Nothing can be gained by panicking.
Good luck.
See, I’ve had these talks with my son. I’m also realistic enough to realize his teen years will include at least a certain amount of experimentation. I’d rather he did not try anything at all, and he certainly knows the dangers involved, particularly drinking and driving. I mean, I was in high school once, and that was the ‘70s. So I’m far from naive on the subject.
And I’m also aware how numbers can seem misleading in these types of studies. Terms can be used to characterize a school. For example, I’m not sure what weight the term “drug infested” carries in this study.
My own high school consisted of a handful of consistent drug uses, a ton of kids who dabbled, and quite a few who didn’t participate at all. Was that drug infested?
Jorge, you’re right about the problem of defining the term ‘drug infested.’ It’s not as if there are 2 kinds of schools—drug free and drug infested. Almost every school has drug use to some degree, so the differences are more like points on a continuum rather than between 2 groups.
The hard thing is that while you can make sure that your kids’ schools offer the right academic environment and opportunities, and are appropriately free of violence, you can’t do much about the drugs. Good schools, even top schools, could have as much of a drug problem as the academically struggling school with the violence problem, though the problem will present itself differently.
One thing I’ve noticed is the huge consumption of alcohol by teenagers. I live next to a golf course, and in close vicinity to a large high school. There is a huge amount of alcohol consumption by teenagers in and around the neighborhood. I’m guessing that some teenagers will fall back on alcohol consumption as a precursor or substitute for illegal drugs, since alcohol is not really illegal, easier to obtain (even as an underaged person) and many parents are less concerned about, and would be more permissive toward, alcohol as opposed to illegal drugs.
Good post, David. In fact, good points by all.
Personally, alcohol is my biggest concern. It is particularly a concern given the number of incidents we have to write about in relation to teen driving and drunken driving. In general, I think we all realize there are going to be opportunities for all of our children to experiment with drugs and alcohol as they grow towards adulthood. It really does come down to parenting and the choices our children make, and that’s where our guidance and influence as parents has to come through.
And this study about substance abuse in schools, whether it’s flawed or not, raises concerns for me as a parent, simply because it places the issue front and center. Whether or not I know my role as a parent on the issue, it is certainly something to be worried about.
There are two schools of thought on this issue: number one, lock them up in the house or make them wear an ankle bracelet until they’re 21 so that you know what they’re doing, who they’re with and where they are at all times. Not the most realistic approach, and one that is dangerous once you remove the restrictions (they tend to go overboard if they’ve been strictly controlled for so long).
Second, arm them with as much information as you can, teach them to make informed decisions and TALK, TALK, TALK. It sounds like you are dad #2. Nothing is guaranteed, and I won’t dare judge anyone since my kids are far from grown and out of the woods yet, but I really think (hope?) that if you teach them to be good decision makers the rest will follow.
Not to frighten anyone, but I have a family member whose son got involved with drugs – and you’d never think it of this kid. His lawyer said that it’s not just for street kids anymore, and that he’s never surprised at who walks through his door needing a lawyer anymore. It’s everywhere. Kids have always thought they’re invincible and they still do.
Alcohol is the number one gateway NARCOTIC DRUG to other illegal narcotic drugs. Alcohol IS a drug that the AMA calls a NARCOTIC but the school systems do not teach that it is.
Why?
The FDA say’s “alcohol is not considered a drug”. The CDC says the same thing…so there’s part of the problem. The alcohol industry lobbies against labling alcohol properly and parents are either ignorant of the facts or are part of the social denial with alcohol.
We are not allowing our kids to mature drug (alcohol) free so they are more than likely graduated with an addiction that helps fill our prisons…etc etc etc.
I cannot believe we allow the alcohol industry free reign to market to teens and also not required to properly lable their DRUG.
Eh, nobody get’s this….but I do.
I went to a “good” high school on Long Island, graduating 20 years ago and by this story’s definition my high school was drug-infested. And besides knowing who took what drugs, I knew students who regularly came to school drunk. And it was common knowledge which teachers indulged in the bottle or other substances.
The school was relatively small (total student body of perhaps 1,100 or so), yet we lost one or more students each year to drunk-driving accidents. As things got worse, the school’s SADD chapter started a “need a ride” hotline on weekends and students also got forms for their parents to sign that basically said, “If I call you up in the middle of the night sometime and ask you to come pick me up, you will do it, without lecturing me or asking questions at that particular moment. In return, I promise not to drive drunk myself nor get in a car with a driver who is drunk.”
The key, I believe, is parental involvement (right on, Doreen B.!). If you’re honest with your children and educate them and make sure you’re involved, that’s the best you can do. You can’t lock your child in his or her room for four years (and by then it’s too late anyhow!) and you can’t follow your child around all the time.
Most of us seem to agree on the need for parental involvement. I think a lot of the childhood friends I had that feel hard into drugs had parents who either weren’t as involved as they should be, or “cool” parents who let their kids drink and get high in their presence. I hate the latter. I lost one high school friend to HIV from drug use, had two do jail time on drug charges and lost a good friend’s older brother in a drunken wreck. Another kid took his own life over a girl after getting drunk. So my high school had plenty of substance abuse.
We all probably have similar situations from our younger years. That would probably make all of our high schools “drug-infested” based on the criteria in this study. To me the point is that these influences are there adn will be there for our kids, so we need to be aware and address it, as with Doreen’s parent #2. Healthy advice.