DARE TO IMPROVE

UA PROJECT AIMS TO CONFRONT DRUG USE BY OLDER KIDS

How do you prevent children and adolescents from abusing drugs, and when is
the best time to reach them? At bottom, those are issues of first priority
in a society bedeviled by drug abuse and in which enticing new drugs seem
to sprout faster than dragon's teeth.

It is no surprise, then, that programs that target drug abuse among
youngsters attract close scrutiny.

To answer the easier question: The best time to reach youngsters is before
peer pressure and false sophistication prompt them to experiment with
drugs. On that basis, school-based programs have become popular vehicles
for drug-abuse prevention campaigns.

Of those programs, the 18-year-old DARE, Drug Abuse Resistance Education,
used by about 75 percent of school districts nationwide, is the best known.
Using police officers who make weekly classroom appearances, DARE offers
lessons to fifth- and sixth-graders about recognizing and resisting the
pressure to use drugs.

How effective is DARE in preventing adolescent drug use? Not very,
according to researchers who say the program's impact fades as children get
older. By their senior year in high school, students who went through DARE
are just as likely to use illegal drugs as those who didn't.

Critics argue the program, largely a holdover from the ``Just Say No''
approach of the 1980s, is too simple, does not focus on older children who
are more likely to be making those decisions and relies on lectures instead
of more effective interactive methods, such as role-playing and discussion.

Also, the prevalence of drug abuse among teen-agers is confirmation that
DARE, even if it were unquestionably effective, wouldn't be adequate to the
task. For example, a study last year showed declining use of tobacco
products, crack and powder cocaine among teen-agers. At the same time, the
use of ecstasy increased across the board, as did heroin among 12th-graders
and steroids among 10th-graders.

It isn't the shortcomings of DARE alone that offer an incentive to find
improvements. Illegal drug labs are springing up in residential basements
in Akron and elsewhere, the manufacturing process often as easy as
following instructions on a Web site.

The challenge of finding a prevention program that is effective has been
taken up by the University of Akron's Institute for Health and Social
Policy, whose new program builds on DARE's content and extensive network of
schools.

The UA program will target older children in the seventh and ninth grades
and use interactive methods that have proved effective in other
abuse-prevention programs, for example, encouraging students to question
their own assumptions about drug use. A $13.5 million grant from the Robert
Wood Johnson Foundation will permit the program to be implemented and
evaluated in five cities across the country over the next five years.

DARE, critics contend, basked too long in the glow of novelty, without the
candid and rigorous evaluation that would have identified its weaknesses
sooner. The controlled program and critical evaluation that the UA program
promises should help build a more effective model.