GRAPEVINE-COLLEYVILLE DISTRICT IS PROUD OF VITAL SIGNS

GRAPEVINE -- Worried that her daughter was experimenting with drugs, a
mother was wondering where she could turn for help.

She found a lifeline in a packet called Vital Signs for a Healthy
Community that gave her a telephone number for Grapevine-Colleyville
school district's Instructional Support Center. There, counselor
Marilyn Rice directed her to a Drug Abuse Resistance Education officer
at her daughter's school.

Vital Signs for a Healthy Community is a one-stop information resource
created by the Instructional Support Center.

The packet, paid for in part with a $500 donation from Baylor Medical
Center at Grapevine, represents a decade of accumulated information
from a community-school effort to keep students in school and off
drugs. "Parents have jobs in Dallas and Fort Worth, and the students
are often left to themselves," said Rice, the district's student
support services coordinator. "The big city is coming, people are
moving in, and they don't have roots, they don't have family support,
and that has made it worse."

Vital Signs for a Healthy Community, the brainchild of the district's
10-year-old Substance Abuse Prevention Committee, includes statistics
on drug and alcohol use, information from anti-drug groups and on
future events, tips on family relationships and parenting, and contact
telephone numbers, including for the Instructional Support Center. The
center, housed in a former pastor's office on Timberline Drive, works
to keep children in school. Part of that mission includes fielding
calls from parents.

As part of the Vital Signs for a Healthy Community effort, the
district is mailing a SAFE HOMES directory of almost 1,000 parents who
have pledged that if teens attend a party at their house, it will be
supervised and won't include alcohol. The directory has been endorsed
by the school district, Texans' War On Drugs and police chiefs in
Colleyville and Grapevine.

"I take it seriously that when children come over to my house, I'll
chaperone them," said parent Becky Meadows of Colleyville. "Vigilance
is not just related to drugs and alcohol. It's important to know what
your kids are doing. I'm interested in them."

Vital Signs for a Healthy Community began last year as a single-page
newsletter. This year, with its extensive information and multiple
inserts, district officials sought the help of students. Some work was
done by students in the Peer Assistance and Leadership program, but
the bulk of the work on the 3,000 packets was done by about 20
students in the special-needs classes at Grapevine High School. It was
then mailed to parents.

Students were excited to see how far-reaching their efforts have
become. "It was hard work, but I think it got a lot of good
information out to a lot of people," said Grapevine High School junior
Christina Watkins of Grapevine.

Drug and alcohol use among Grapevine-Colleyville district students is
slightly higher than the state average at the high school level but
lower than the state average at the middle school level. Officials say
the good news at the lower level may be because of anti-drug efforts
aimed at younger students.

Rice said that at the high school level, substance abuse can be tied
to lingering apathy about alcohol and so-called recreational drug use.

Vital Signs for a Healthy Community may be making a difference.
Carroll, Fort Worth, Hurst-Euless-Bedford and Keller school districts
requested Vital Signs for a Healthy Community packets to study, said
Martha Sayre, Grapevine-Colleyville's student support services assistant.

Area medical officials also laud the program's effort to protect the
health and welfare of the community.

"This is obviously a very proactive and positive approach to dealing
with the anti-drug program," said Amy Wetzel, marketing coordinator
for Baylor Medical Center at Grapevine.

For program information, call Student Support Services at 251-5521.
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