HALTING METH HABIT BEFORE IT STARTS

Programs Teach About Dangers

Along with algebra and grammar, a growing number of middle and high
school students in Broome and Tioga counties are learning lessons
about methamphetamine production and addiction in their communities.

Several school districts -- including Chenango Forks, Windsor,
Whitney Point, Harpursville and Newark Valley -- are teaming with
Lourdes Hospital in Binghamton to provide mandatory and
extra-curricular classes to counter a rising trend of methamphetamine
addiction and related problems, including child abuse and neglect.

Lourdes recently received about $1.8 million from the federal Office
of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Programs to fund the programs
over four years.

The funding, which will support six full-time, seven part-time and
about 25 temporary hourly workers, will extend existing programs or
add new ones targeting mostly rural districts, said Patrick Basile,
manager of Lourdes Family Support Program.

The programs include:

* Families and Schools Together (FAST), an elective after-school
program that includes meals, activities and counseling for families
designed to increase parental involvement with children drawn to
risky behaviors.

* ALL STARS, a classroom program geared to help adolescent and older
students avoid the pitfalls of substances abuse and violence as they
experience more social pressures and independence.

The programs include sections that educate students and teachers
about risks of methamphetamine, commonly called meth, and how to
recognize telltale signs of abuse or production in their
neighborhoods or peer groups.

"If you can educate a community about the signs and symptoms, you can
decrease production," said Terrie Atwood, substance abuse prevention
manager for Lourdes.

The drug, a highly addictive stimulant that has a street value up to
$50,000 a pound, is made from over-the-counter cold remedies,
including pseudo-ephedrine/ephedrine.

The process involves distilling and cooking ingredients, which
produces strong orders, toxic waste and fire hazards.

The underground methamphetamine industry tends to thrive in rural
areas, where there is ample land and abandoned structures -- old
barns or out-buildings -- to hide labs. The Lourdes programs are
intended to giving students from middle school on up an eye-opening
look about the hazards, smells and physical effects of
methamphetamine production with the intention of opening new doors to
preventing it.

Often, because of the compulsive nature of abusers in the grip of
addiction, child neglect and meth production go hand in hand.

Drug-prevention programs also exist in Binghamton, Johnson City,
Union-Endicott and Maine-Endwell, but they do not have sections
dedicated to methamphetamine.

Unlike DARE, a drug prevention program that grew popular in the 1990s
and still exists in some schools, ALL STARS and FAST are
"evidence-based," meaning their effectiveness has been proven in
clinical trials, Atwood said.

School administrators welcome the programs. ALL STARS is typically
added to health education curriculums for all students and FAST is
scheduled after school for parents who feel they need to communicate
better with their children.

The recent funding will help districts stretch other federal money
from the federal Safe and Drug Free Schools programs, administrators said.

Such programs are "an attempt to get kids to think about decisions
they are going to have to make. There is not always going to be a
parent or teacher leaning over their shoulder," said William Burke,
principal at Chenango Forks Middle School.

They work -- sometimes.

"Some kids, we give them all kinds of warnings and all kinds of
programs and for whatever reasons they still end up in those
dangerous spots," Burke added.

The clinically proven approach of FAST and ALL STARS is good, he
said, but the school also is continuing its DARE program, which
includes educational visits and lectures from police.

"It's good for kids to get to build a healthy relationship with
police and not just see them as somebody who comes when there is
trouble," he said.