Copyright: 2004 The Birmingham News
Contact: Epage@bhamnews.com
Website: http://al.com/birminghamnews/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/45
Author: Carla Crowder
Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/dare.htm (D.A.R.E.)

DARE STILL POPULAR DESPITE CRITICISM

The graduates wore matching DARE T-shirts, bright white with an anti-drug
message and a smiling lion. Parents packed the bleachers inside the Concord
Elementary gym, a friendly audience for the guest speaker, Jefferson County
Sheriff Mike Hale.

Hale got in a plug for his upcoming bass tournament before handing out DARE
diplomas. And he promised to crack down on reckless coal trucks barreling
through nearby roads.

"Most importantly, you've made a decision in regards to alcohol, tobacco
and drugs," the sheriff in uniform and badge told the fifth-graders
squirming in their chairs. "I congratulate you DARE graduates on the right
choice."

By high school, however, some of these 10- and 11-year-olds forget all
about the DARE workbooks and lions and pledges never to drink.

A 2003 statewide survey of sixth-through 12th-graders showed that more than
40 percent of 10th- and 11th-graders drank alcoholic beverages, and more
than 25 percent of them smoked marijuana.

Numerous academic studies over the last dozen years - including one
requested by the U.S. Department of Justice and conducted in North
Carolina's Research Triangle Institute - show the lessons taught by police
to fifth-graders have had no lasting effects on youth drug use. Now, the
Los Angeles-based DARE America (Drug Abuse Resistance Education) is
revamping its curriculum to reach seventh- and ninth-graders.

"We are following the latest science and research, and the latest science
and research tells us you have to reach young people at the middle school
age," said DARE Southeast Regional Director John Lindsay.

"I do think it will be better, based on the science, the research and the
results we've received so far," Lindsay said.

Much is at stake for the California agency started by former Los Angeles
Police Chief Daryl Gates.

Popular in Alabama:

Across the country, many cash-strapped school districts and police
departments dropped DARE after bad reviews started coming in. DARE revised
lessons once before in the mid-1990s, but the research found the same failures.

Alabama state agencies no longer pass federal money to DARE because the No
Child Left Behind Act bans it, saying government dollars must go to
research-based, evidence-driven programs. Despite the loss of federal
dollars, DARE is so entrenched in Alabama that it doesn't appear to be
going away.

"I think it's wonderful that they teach it this early. I hope they keep
it," said Wendy Taylor, as she photographed her son standing beside Hale
after the DARE ceremony.

Similar scenes to last week's graduation at Concord Elementary play out
regularly in elementary schools across Alabama.

Last year, DARE's core program for fifth-graders reached 33,217 children.
When activities for other grades are factored in, the anti-drug program
reached 71,684 pupils in 713 Alabama schools, according to DARE.

School districts devote classroom time and local dollars to DARE curriculum
and copyrighted merchandise. DARE America collected $2.5 million in 2002 in
licensing royalties from shirts, bumper stickers and miscellaneous items
sold nationwide.

Sue Adams, who administers federal Safe and Drug Free Schools funds for the
Alabama Department of Education, said she doesn't know how much Alabama
spent on DARE before the federal government pulled the plug two years ago.
But school leaders still love it.

"One of the main things they like is the interaction between a law
enforcement person and the students," Adams said. "Getting them to
understand that law enforcement folks are not bad folks, they're good
folks, and we need them."

Ninety-nine sheriff's and police departments in Alabama devoted 182
officers to classroom lessons. Graduation appearances, like Hale's visit to
Concord, provide a forum for elected leaders to reach voters. The Jefferson
County Commission last week approved Hale's request for another $25,000 for
the program.

Why the devotion to DARE?

"Because DARE is perceived as being a magic bullet," said UAB criminologist
John Sloan. "When it comes to issues involving drugs and crime, we're
always looking for that Holy Grail."

DARE makes sense on a number of levels, Sloan said. He believes the
officers who teach it are dedicated and knowledgeable. "Problem is, parents
who support it, they're not following kids long-term who get out of this
program," Sloan said.

Research critical:

Dennis P. Rosenbaum, director of the Center for Research in Law and Justice
at the University of Illinois at Chicago, said the research may eventually
stop the flow of public money into DARE.

"Arguably, the scientific community may be having some impact in the long
run. Dozens of communities are abandoning the DARE program. But then other
countries are joining. Similar to cigarette manufacturers, the market may
be elsewhere, in populations where knowledge is less of a nuisance,"
Rosenbaum, who has evaluated DARE, wrote in an e-mail.

"The problem with many programs is that they take on a life of their own
that is impervious to outside feedback or scientific evaluation. Despite
overwhelming evidence of it's ineffectiveness in reducing drug use, DARE
continues to have many supporters," the professor wrote.

Zili Sloboda, a researcher at the University of Akron Institute of Health
and Policy, is leading the redesign of DARE and the latest study, a
five-year look at the new DARE lessons for seventh- and ninth-graders.

She said DARE's growing pains reflect society's lack of knowledge, overall,
about how to keep people away from drugs.

"This whole field of substance abuse prevention is a relatively new field,"
she said.

It wasn't until the late 1990s when scientists knew the components of a
good drug-prevention program, she said.

Formerly an epidemiologist with the National Institute of Drug Abuse,
Sloboda is familiar with criticisms of DARE because her division funded
many of the previous studies.

"What they showed us was an elementary program - without any boosters in
middle and high schools when kids are most at risk - isn't going to have
any long-term effect," she said.

Results of the new study are expected in 2006.

DARE staff is known for bombarding critics, and often their bosses, with
phone calls, faxes and complaints trying to sway public opinion against
critical research, according to officials and national reports.

Like other professors and government officials who speak out against DARE,
Sloan said he was immediately contacted by a DARE official after previous
comments in The Birmingham News. He received a fax from Lindsay, the
regional director.

The fax stated what the ongoing research would show. "Well, how ... do you
know what the evaluation will show until it's done?" Sloan asked.

Lindsay said it did not appear that Sloan had the latest information based
on comments he'd made in news stories.

"The intent of my fax was to provide him with the latest University of
Akron study information," Lindsay said.

He said he did not recall his exact language on the fax.