DARE STILL FINDS SUPPORT WITH PUEBLO-AREA PRINCIPALS

PUEBLO-- While some cities and districts are dropping the controversial
DARE program, principals in at least one corner of Colorado say they plan
to stick with the youth drug-prevention program.

DARE, or Drug Awareness Resistance Education, brings law enforcement
officers into fifth- and sixth-grade classrooms to teach children about the
dangers of substance abuse.

The program has been criticized by some because it exposes to kids to drugs
by way of discussion. Others say there is no hard-and-fast data to prove
that it works.

The costly program has been scrapped or broadly modified by the Boulder
police and sheriff's department and the police department in Louisville,
also in Boulder County.

But Pueblo-area school principals responding to an informal survey last
week said they favor DARE. Most said they believe the positive exposure to
police is at least as important as the subject matter.

"The program provides the students with refusal skills," said Kent Burger,
principal at Sunset Elementary.

"I'd rather they hear about the harm drugs cause in an educational setting
then on the streets," Burger said.

Belmont Elementary principal Jose Duarte said he is "happy with DARE"
because it students get to know the enforcement officer involved and "see
that he's a person, too."

"They also find out about drugs and alcohol in a positive, proactive way,"
Duarte said. "Yes, it's a parent's job to tell the kid, but not all parents
do."

At Vineland Elementary, principal Elizabeth Trujillo praised the sheriff's
deputy who presents the program. She said that while she has not seem
statistics on whether DARE works, she thinks it helps her students.

"Peer pressure is awful tough on a kid," Trujillo said. "DARE teaches the
kids what can happen and introduces them to the subject in a constructive
way."

The officers generally work for about an hour a week with a class, which
lasts one semester and ends with a graduation ceremony.

Checked-by: Mike Gogulski