Pubdate: Fri, 30 Aug 2002
Source: Daily Camera (CO)
Copyright: 2002 The Daily Camera.
Contact:  http://www.thedailycamera.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/103
Author: Amy Bounds
Cited: Boulder Valley School District http://www.bvsd.k12.co.us/

Anti-Drug Strategies Sought

BVSD Finding New Ways to Reach Students, Parents

Four teens who are recovering drug addicts have volunteered to
participate in a speaker's bureau on substance abuse to let parents
and students know what addiction is really like.

The Boulder Valley School District also is recruiting high school
students who can speak to middle-schoolers about drugs and alcohol and
is revamping the health curriculum to make it more relevant. Plus,
there's a push to get parents involved in the issue through forums at
individual schools.

Those are some of the efforts of the district's substance-abuse task
force, which started last year with the goal of developing a plan to
address risky behaviors among Boulder Valley students.

"We do have a problem in Boulder Valley schools, and we need to
address it," said Boulder Valley Superintendent George Garcia at a
strategy meeting Thursday attended by about 30 parents, students and
school district officials.

The extent of the problem was documented by a student survey last
year. The anonymous survey, designed by the U.S. Centers for Disease
Control and Prevention was given to about 1,100 Boulder Valley students.

It found that almost half of high school students drink alcohol and
nearly a third participated in binge drinking at least once in the
month before the survey.

More than half of juniors and seniors had tried marijuana, the survey
showed. Almost 30 percent of high school students had been offered,
sold or given illegal drugs on school property. The survey showed that
marijuana is the most prevalent drug, with a fourth of students using
it.

David Roberts, a 15-year-old who attended Fairview High School and is
currently a student at SOAR High School in Broomfield as part of a
drug treatment program, said the key to reaching students is to employ
other students with similar experiences.

"No one is going to get through to me except somebody like me," he
said. "The more my parents told me not to do something, the more I was
going to do it."

Another former Boulder Valley student, 16-year-old Dan Bowers, said
parents who don't want their students to drink should set an example
by not drinking themselves.

Among the strategies that don't work, the students said, are
assemblies led by adults and zero-tolerance rules. They also said
large high schools can create isolation. One of the suggestions that
came out of the meeting was to provide class time for students to talk
to each other about what's going on in their lives.

Three districtwide community forums on substance abuse are planned for
October.

The Oct. 15 forum is at Boulder High School; the Oct. 22 forum is at
Monarch High School; and the Oct. 29 forum is at Broomfield High. All
are scheduled from 6:30 to 8:30 p.m. 
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MAP posted-by: Richard Lake