DARE PROGRAM VALUABLE

With the start of another school year, I thought it was important to
educate the public about what the DARE program is and how it works.

DARE stands for Drug Abuse Resistance Education. It is delivered by
specially trained police officers more than 10 one-hour lessons. DARE
forms one part of a larger drug abuse prevention program that the
police offer to the community. Preventing drug abuse is key to
reducing crime in our community. That is a fact. Police officers have
a unique knowledge base to teach students about drug abuse since they
have real life, everyday exposure to it's effects on people and the
community.

Students who take the DARE program are taught the DARE decision making
model as a formula to making healthy choices. In this model students:
Define the situation (ie. someone is offering them a cigarette);
Assess their choices; choose a Response; and then Evaluate their decision.

As a trained teacher as well as a police officer, I understand how
important it is for young people to think about their choices and look
back to see if they have made the right choice. It is this very
process that leads youth to make better decisions as they age and
mature. The DARE decision making model encourages this type of self
reflection.

It is now widely accepted that youth require a certain amount of
developmental assets to succeed in life. (See the Search Institute's
40 Developmental Assets).

The more assets a youth possesses the greater chance that youth will
grow up healthy, caring and responsible.

The DARE program encourages and builds on many of these identified
assets.

Each DARE lesson helps to build on at least 3 (usually more) of the
developmental assets.

Some people believe that the DARE program is providing untrue or
skewed information to students. To the contrary, students are provided
with fact sheets relating to alcohol, tobacco and marijuana that
relate to health risks and physiological changes the drugs have on
your body.

Whatever you believe about drugs, it is fact they harm your body and
it is fact that when people become addicted to drugs it ruins their,
and oftentimes their families', lives.

The DARE program is attempting to provide students with important
information, a model to assist in continuing to make healthy choices
and the strength to resist abusing substances that can ruin their lives.

The students get to meet the officer's and form positive interactions
thus building trust. They soon come to the realization that the police
are real people with a goal to help them make positive choices and
succeed in their community.

Yet another strong component of the program involves the parents. Each
parent is given a break down of each lesson and encouraged to have
interactive discussions with their children after the fact in the
family setting. Parents are welcome to sit in on the lessons and
participate with the graduation lesson at the end of the 10-week session.

Constable Jeff Scott

RCMP School Liaison Officer

Parksville