DARE's effectiveness gets poor grade again

Education isn't cutting drug use, study says

By TODD ACKERMAN Copyright 1997 Houston Chronicle

CHICAGO Another national study casts doubt on the effectiveness of a
popular drugresistance program already questioned by some Houston City
Council members.

A study released at the annual meeting of the American Psychological
Association here Sunday found that the Drug Abuse Resistance Education
program, or DARE, failed to lessen both male and female students' use of
alcohol, cigarettes or marijuana six years later.

"Over time, students lose faith in the message," UCLA psychologist Jodie
Ullman wrote in the study. "They identify DARE as part of their childhood,
and by age 15, they actively disassociate themselves from virtually
everything that is `kid stuff,' including DARE."

The study was the first to look at the longerterm effects of DARE.
Previous studies, which also found little or no effect, interviewed DARE
graduates immediately after or three years after the program.

Those studies prompted critical comments by Houston City Council members
Martha Wong and Ray Driscoll two months ago. Wong said, "If it's not
effective, let's try something else," and Driscoll said he thought the
public had been "oversold" on the program.

DARE, the most widely disseminated schoolbased program in the nation,
involves uniformed police officers teaching 17 weekly lessons to fifth and
sixthgraders on the dangers of drugs, alcohol and gangs, as well as the
importance of respecting authority and resisting peer pressure. Locally, it
is operated through the Houston Police Department and other law enforcement
agencies and costs about $3 million a year.

The new study also found that DARE made no difference in a student's time
spent on homework, number of classes skipped, educational aspirations or
attitudes toward school or teachers. Nor did it find differences between
those who participated in the program and those who didn't in incidents of
fighting, assault, theft, trespassing, curfew violation and gang membership.

The study compared the responses in sixth and 12th grades of 356 DARE
graduates and 264 students who did not participate in the program on
questions about lifestyle and drug use.

The study found that DARE appeared to have a small but statistically
significant effect on male high school seniors. Those participating in the
program used harder drugs, such as cocaine, LSD and amphetamines, less than
males who weren't in the program. Roughly 80 percent of DARE graduates
reported never using hard drugs, compared to about 76 percent of nonDARE
graduates.

There was no effect with females, of which neither group used hard drugs.

The study also found that DARE graduates reported they committed less
vandalism and attached more importance to helping others than nonparticipants.

Study coauthor Judith Stein, also a UCLA psychologist, said the possible
positive effect of discouraging harddrug use by males was worth a closer
look before scrapping DARE. She said they think the program definitely
needs "booster shots" after the sixth grade.

Two other studies released at the APA meeting also found that schoolbased
sex education has failed to curb sexual behavior, and that Congress'
Children's Television Act of 1990 has not resulted in more educational and
informative television.

The first study found that sex education hasn't worked well because the
curriculum ignores the importance of family and social skills development,
and because it is too focused on abstinence. The second study found that
broadcasters were overstating their educational programming available to
children by creatively relabeling preexisting shows, such as Teenage
Mutant Ninja Turtles and Yogi Bear as educational.