BUMPER DRUG CROP HITS SCHOOL

A bumper cannabis crop is being blamed for a Wairarapa school
recording one of the highest suspension rates in New Zealand.

Makoura College handed out the punishment 62 times last year, with 24
students suspended for drugs in February and March when a surplus of
cannabis flooded the market, Education Ministry student support
manager Peter Norton said.

As a proportion of its 402 students, Makoura recorded its highest ever
suspension rate last year and the fourth highest rate in New Zealand.

The school had since joined a project involving iwi, which had
resulted in suspensions dropping to four in the first term this year,
Mr Norton said.

College principal Chris Scott could not be reached for comment
yesterday.

Drugs were also among the most common reasons for suspensions at
Murupara's Rangitahi College, Northland's Te Rangi Aniwaniwa School
and Auckland's Hato Petera College, which were also in the top five
schools with the highest suspension rates as a proportion of their
roll.

Though cannabis was illegal, schools were criticised for drug-testing
pupils and sometimes came under fire from parents whose children were
suspended for drug use, Mr Norton said.

"Schools have started to become the village policeman in certain
areas. If they ring up and say we want the police to come in and clamp
down on marijuana, the police sometimes say this is not a priority."

ACT education spokeswoman Deborah Coddington said decriminalising
cannabis would make the drug cheaper and easier to get, creating more
problems. Schools could not be blamed for suspending pupils for drugs,
alcohol abuse, arson, theft, vandalism and attacks on classmates and
teachers. "It's not just bad behaviour that needs a bit of
counselling. These are young crooks in the making."

Van Asch Deaf Education Centre in Christchurch had the highest
suspension rate last year, with eight suspensions among its 34 pupils
for continual disobedience, sexual misconduct, weapons, assaults on
students and verbal attacks on teachers. In explanation, associate
principal Marie O'Brien said the residential coeducational school took
children with "difficult behaviour" and cared for them seven days a
week, unlike mainstream schools.

Green MP Nandor Tanczos said he shared teachers' concerns about
cannabis use and students' easy access to the drug. "Nobody wants to
see kids stoned at school. Obviously it's going to interfere with
their education . . . In some ways that's why I'm so adamant we need
law reform. What we are doing now, it's not working."