DARE DOESN'T STICK WITH KIDS

The DARE program has always made me queasy, with its rote exercises and
uniformed cops doing tap dances to keep 10-year-olds entertained.

For almost two decades it has been the national drug-resistance program of
choice, a way for schools to get that feel-good buzz that comes from taking
care of something and checking it off the list.

It's wholesome and clear-cut: Local police officers take command of a
fifth-grade classroom each week for an hour of what can only be described
as propaganda. Its anti-drug, anti-tobacco and anti-alcohol message is one
parents and school districts heartily embrace, but do we seriously think
kids are getting it?

They're just too young, and most of them too naive. They haven't faced the
scorching peer pressure that starts once you leave the elementary-school
womb for the snake pit that is middle school. That's when you stuff your
DARE-issued T-shirt into the closet because it's definitely not cool.

It's easy to get youngsters this age to buy into things; most of them still
have that wide-open trust. They don't yet have hormones coursing through
their bodies. DARE feeds into that with its simplistic, just-say-no
approach. Kids become so hypersensitized you feel like a sleaze having a
glass of wine around them. Smoking a cigarette is even worse.

I don't even smoke, but it troubles me to see kids being so zero-tolerance
about anything. Life is rarely black and white. What young people really
need is a program that begins later, when people they know actually do
begin to smoke pot or drink.

National statistics drive this home. University of Michigan researchers
found that 80 percent of 12th-graders questioned had experimented with
alcohol, while 62 percent had smoked cigarettes, and 49 percent had tried
marijuana. Ecstasy use is on the rise.

Wisely, DARE (it stands for Drug Abuse Resistance Program) is responding
with a new curriculum for seventh through ninth grades. However, the
testing period will last several years and only a handful of schools will
be included.

Do we really want to keep spending $226 million nationwide on a program
that is proving itself ineffective?

I attended a DARE class at Sun Terrace Elementary School in Concord last
week, just to see what goes on. That city's police department budgets about
$120,000 a year for two DARE officers, who have other responsibilities as well.

Officer Michelle Costeiu had her hands full, since it was a combination of
two classes totaling 60 students. The topic for the day was consequences.

The kids were squiggling from the get-go, and Costeiu struggled to hold
their attention. She reminded them of the "egg-salad story": If someone
offers you an egg-salad sandwich, even if you like egg salad, you don't
have to eat it. It's the same with drugs, she said.

"What if they're older, what if they threaten to beat you up," asked one boy.

They can make you feel bad, but just leave, she responded.

Other officers go to greater lengths to keep their fifth graders
entertained. When a man was killed in a Walnut Creek electronics store
recently, this newspaper's police reporter had trouble getting information,
but the daughter of one of our editors heard the whole story from her DARE
officer.

Costeiu admits the challenges are great, but she firmly believes in DARE as
a counterpoint to the confusing barrage of messages being thrown at these
kids. Mostly, it's a launch pad for discussion at home.

"Bottom line, DARE is only as effective as the parents want it to be," she
says.

I'm not convinced. What makes more sense is the Youth Educator Program, run
by the nonprofit Center for Human Development in Pleasant Hill. It's
already in most high schools in Contra Costa and some in Alameda and Solano
counties.

Rather than an authority figure, like a cop in uniform, it uses volunteer
high school juniors and seniors to spread the word. After intensive
training, they coach seventh and eighth graders not only about resisting
drugs, alcohol and tobacco, but how to deflect violence and cope with
emotional turmoil in healthy ways. They talk down and dirty about HIV and
AIDS, and make themselves available as mentors.

Both teen-agers who have experimented with drugs and those who haven't are
welcomed into the program, says Director Patty Garcia.

"They really perk up and listen to these kids," she says, because in middle
school, kids are pulling away from their parents and are much more
interested in what peers have to say.

As for DARE, she's reluctant to comment.

"My only concern is that they're not there for when it really gets intense
in junior high," says Garcia. "I think consistency is important. If you're
going to give this message, you've got to keep giving it."