SURVEY: "EASY TO GET DRUGS'

HAMPTON - Alcohol and marijuana use among Winnacunnet High School
students has declined in the last four years, according to the results
of a Youth Risk Behavior Survey. However, a greater percentage of
Winnacunnet students smoke cigarettes, use cocaine, or have tried
heroin than the state average, according to survey results.

The reason for the greater percentage of Winnacunnet High School
students showing higher use could be attributed to the error rate
built into the state survey, according to Jeffrey Metzger, senior
management analyst for the survey.

The individual high school surveys have no sampling error built in, he
said.

"In reality they're probably not higher," Metzger said. "The absolute
values are not higher when you account for error in the state sample."

The state Department of Education administers a high school risk
behavior survey every two years. Individual high schools may also
choose to participate in their own survey, with those results released
by the state Department of Health and Human Services.

Winnacunnet participated in 2005 and in 2001.

Forty-five percent of Winnacunnet students said they had a drink
within the last month, compared to 49-percent of students in 2001 and
44 percent statewide in 2005.

Student answers to alcohol and pot use fall within the average of high
school students statewide, according to both surveys.

There has been no formal comparison between the risk results statewide
and those of individual high schools, Metzger said.

Metzger was asked how high school staff and administrators could make
use of the data without such comparisons.

"One is the absolute face value of it," he said. "Do you want 33
percent of students saying it's sort of easy, very easy, to get a drug
like cocaine, LSD or amphetamines? This is one out of three."

Thirty-three percent of Winnacunnet students said it was "sort of" or
"very easy" to get these drugs, according to the survey results.

For its report, the state took a random sample of 1,276 students out
of the 17,266 high school students who took the survey.

Nineteen high schools participated in both the state and local
surveys, with Winnacunnet being one of those schools. The answers of
16 Winnacunnet students went into the state sample.

The data are used to determine where the state should put its efforts
in reducing risk, Metzger said.

"I'm in prevention services, concerned with alcohol, tobacco and
drugs," he said. "I'm using it big time."

The data will form a strategic prevention plan to administer a state
grant of $11.2 million toward drug and alcohol prevention and treatment.

"We're on the launching pad of this thing," Metzger said.