Pubdate: Wed, 23 Feb 2005
Source: Daily Free Press (Boston U, MA Edu)
Copyright: 2005 Back Bay Publishing, Inc.
Contact:  http://www.dailyfreepress.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/796
Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/pot.htm (Cannabis)
Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/dare.htm (D.A.R.E.)
Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/youth.htm (Youth)

PARENTS VITAL IN DRUG LESSONS

The national war on drugs was dealt an embarrassing defeat on the home 
front today, as the Partnership for a Drug Free America released a report 
showing that nearly half of parents would be unconcerned to learn their 
children has used marijuana.

While D.A.R.E. and other well-funded programs bombard elementary and middle 
school children with dishonest propaganda and scare tactics, the government 
has completely glanced over the true school of social education: the 
American home. Parents serve as the first and most influential behavior 
model for children and they should take a deliberate role in teaching their 
children about drugs - using their own experience as a model.

The federal government and its various agencies have practiced an 
aggressive zero-tolerance approach toward drugs since the early 1980s. As 
"graduates" of the D.A.R.E. program, most Boston University students can 
attest that this approach involves exaggerated accounts of illicit drug 
uses and down-right lies on their effects and addictiveness. The result is 
counterproductive: teenagers who eventually experiment with mild drugs 
realize they have been lied to and automatically discount their entire 
substance education, including good information about truly dangerous drugs.

D.A.R.E. also introduces kids to drugs for the first time at the elementary 
school level with videos and lessons that essentially say "this is what big 
kids do." In essence, American drug education has been effectively 
"selling" the idea of drug use to children for two decades.

Many American parents, having grown up during the 1960s, 70s and 80s, have 
the first-hand experiences necessary to teach children a realistic, 
moderate approach to drugs.

Much of the attraction of substance use for teens is the allure of breaking 
the rules, rebelling against what is taught in school and creating a secret 
life outside their parent's control. When parents sit down and honestly 
discuss the effects of drugs and encourage their children to be cautious 
and moderate when faced with them, they deflate that appeal and extinguish 
its novelty.

Parents can also set guidelines and explain the true risks of drugs.

The flexibility of an honest education equips teenagers with knowledge they 
can actually apply to the reality of drug use - something the rigid and 
heavy-handed teaching of D.A.R.E. have failed to do. Parents, with their 
experience and honesty, have a chance to succeed where two decades of drug 
education has failed.

Programs like D.A.R.E., which garner millions of dollars in federal 
funding, have consistently failed to make a dent in the American "drug 
problem." Now it turns out that this is partly because they receive little 
support from behind.

Education starts in the home, and the federal government will never be able 
to instill values in children like parents can. Instead of bombarding 
children with a lesson plan parents know to be bogus, the government should 
encourage parents to retake their children's social education.

Parent's should share their life experience and its lessons with their 
children and advocate a safe approach to drug use. The war on drugs cannot 
be won in the classroom alone.
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MAP posted-by: Beth