DRUG COMMITTEE AIMS FOR BETTER CHOICES

There was a time when students caught with drugs or alcohol at school
were automatically told they were not welcome at their school for several days.

This sort of automatic out-of-school suspension is fast becoming a
thing of the past in School District 69 (Qualicum) however, as
Ballenas Secondary principal Rollie Koop and colleague Gillian Wilson
from the District Drug and Alcohol Review Committee explained Tuesday night.

Speaking at the regular board meeting, the pair detailed the new
approach to drug and alcohol incidents in the district, noting the
old, punishment-based model did little more than put the students
behind in their work and expose them to the risk of further substance abuse.

Although the automatic out of school suspension model is no longer in
favour, that doesn't mean students who come to school high or drunk
get off scott free. Far from it, but the committee tailors the very
real consequences to the individual situation.

"One size doesn't fit all when it comes to substance abuse," Koop
said. "We look at where kids are on the continuum of use. We've had
kids appear before us who may have been caught the first time they
experimented, and we've had students who were entrenched in some
dangerous patterns."

The focus, he said, is to educate, provide support, make positive
changes, prevent escalation of substance use and ensure the safety of
students is paramount.

"When a student is found to be outside policy in terms of use or
possession, we put them in an in-school suspension and begin the
process of working with them to prepare them for a meeting with the
district drug and alcohol committee, so they can understand their own
use patterns and can look at the impacts on themselves and on others.
We want to move them towards a commitment to reduced use or abstinence."

The process has been successful, Koop said, noting the new model
allows students and their families to discuss what's going on in their lives.

"We have an open and honest conversation with their families and find
out where they are at in the continuum of abuse and then shape our
path in terms of recommendations for education, counselling and
discipline," Koop said.

Wilson noted most students caught with drugs or alcohol are from high
schools and are male. She cautioned against reading too much into this.

"Girls may be better at not getting caught."

The pair related some of the stories they've heard from students and
they were heart-wrenching.

"There was a student last year who I suspected was a regular user,
but who showed no signs," Wilson said. "He slipped up and came to
school under the influence of alcohol. He had shame and guilt and
wanted to hide things and be this perfect person. With a suspension,
the shame would have continued."

One of the darkest stories, Koop said, was unanticipated.

"There was a young man we were working with for a year but were never
able to get to the truth about his behaviours or use," Koop said. "In
that hour-long interview, the disclosure came to us that for a
two-year period this young man had been a guinea pig for a local drug
dealer. Every time a new shipment of drugs came into the community,
the adult tested them on this young man to determine the strength of
the drug and its impact."

That, he continued, is the key to the new direction's success - to
find out what is going on in a student's life and to steer them
towards making better choices.

"We are moving in the right direction," Wilson said. "We are helping
families find solutions."