MOLINE TO KEEP DARE GOING

For at least another year, elementary students in the Moline School District
will take part in Drug Abuse Resistance education, or DARE.

Moline School Board members voted 5-2 Monday night to keep the program at
the elementary level for the 2004-05 school year.

District officials said mixed research data on DARE's effectiveness has left
them with a few concerns, so they plan annual reviews of local and national
data.

Those who voted in favor of the drug and peer pressure prevention effort
said they see it as "much more than just an hour in the classroom."

"I think it's been good for the district so far," said board member and
teacher Karen Buchanan. "We need a good connection between students and the
police department, and it's working positively for us."

Board members who voted against the program cited the lack of
"overwhelmingly supportive data" and the amount of time and money spent on
DARE as reasons it should have been eliminated.

"I also think all districts are faced with money crunching and this does
cost financially," board president Bob Tallitsch said. "It's not a large
budget impact, but anything that costs could prohibit the hiring of a
teacher."

Tallitsch said he may have voiced his opposition and voted against the
program, but he has no problem being out-voted. "It's a majority vote and
that's OK. As a board, we are all looking out for what is best for the
students."

Moline school officials said they have been studying the program for about a
year, looking at national research as well as conducting surveys of their
own.

Les Huddle, assistant superintendent of curriculum and instruction, said the
local surveys are taken by 200 seventh- and eighth-grade students, and show
overwhelming support from students.

About 525 sixth-graders take the DARE course each year.

Huddle and others said they want to see a formal evaluation of the program
now that it will continue.

One of the concerns was the amount of time spent taking the DARE classes --
time spent away from core instruction, Huddle said. The money spent on the
program, which equals the salary for one-half of one of the two police
officers who conduct classes, was not the impetus behind the study.

The Moline Police Department pays for the remaining 1 1/2 positions.

However, with a new curriculum set to launch next school year, the time
spent by each student in DARE class each semester will be reduced from 17
hours to 10 or 12, Huddle said.

More than 36 million students take part in DARE programs this year,
according to www.dare.org. While several communities have chosen to
discontinue DARE, 1,000 new programs started within the past three years.

Eighty percent of school districts in the United States teach the
curriculum, officials said.

In Davenport, the program has struggled to remain in the district.

The Davenport City Council, as part of its 2003 budget-cutting initiative,
eliminated the city's financial support of the program for the 2004 fiscal
year, and the school district's annual pledge of $20,000 also came to a halt
in 2003.