Pubdate: Mon, 14 Nov 2005
Source: Walker County Messenger (GA)
Copyright: 2005 Walker County Messenger.
Contact:  http://news.mywebpal.com/index.cfm?pnpid=730
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/2755
Author: Eric Beavers
Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/find?135 (Drug Education)
Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/meth.htm (Methamphetamine)

SCHOOL WILL HOLD FUNERAL FOR "METH VICTIM"

A virtual victim of meth abuse will be laid to rest on Wednesday at the 
Walker County Alternative Education Center in Chickamauga, school officials 
said.

Chris Sikes, principal at the school, said he hopes the dramatization will 
keep students from using methamphetamine and other drugs or alcohol.

Sikes said most Walker County students probably have firsthand experience 
with meth use, whether it is from friends or family manufacturing, selling 
or using the drug.

"If you can scare them enough to keep them away from it, it's a definitely 
a good thing," Sikes said. "That's what we're going for."

Cindy Hawkins, area director for the Council on Alcohol and Drug Abuse, got 
the idea for the "funeral" while attending a conference in Summerville, 
Sikes said. An officer there has the means to present the funeral, 
including a coffin, in a way that educates people about the dangers 
associated with meth.

"Inside the coffin is an actual meth lab," Sikes said. "We are trying to 
perform a mock funeral in the old Osburn Cemetery behind the school."

The school has permission to use the cemetery and Wilson Funeral Homes will 
provide a funeral tent, Sikes said.

Vanita Hullender, Catoosa County coroner and founder of the Catoosa 
Citizens Drug Task Force, is expected to speak to students about her 
meetings with drug users, he said.

"(Hullender) will read a poem from a person who actually died from meth," 
Sikes said.

State Rep. Jay Neal of LaFayette, state Sen. Jeff Mullis of Chickamauga, 
and Walker County Sheriff Steve Wilson have also been invited to speak to 
students.

The skit ties into the life skills class at the school, which includes drug 
and alcohol awareness, taught by Erin Collins, Sikes said. The 45-minute 
event is intended for the 60 students at the school and is not open to the 
public.

Collins helped create the program. "We're dealing specifically with a major 
problem right now in Walker County -- the production, the selling and the 
use of meth," Collins said. "We're hitting the problem head-on."

He plans to flesh out the program created for the Alternative Education 
Center so it could be used at other schools in the district.

"This is the beginning of something and we're kind of keeping our fingers 
crossed that everything comes together," Collins said. "It's a trial run 
but we have invited a lot of people."

Students enrolled in the AEC "have usually experienced significant 
behavioral and/or attendance problems in school and traditional ways of 
correcting those problems have not been successful," Sikes wrote on the 
school's website at www.walkerschools.org/aec. "Our program offers a very 
structured environment, free of most of the distractions found in a regular 
school."
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MAP posted-by: Jay Bergstrom