SIXTH-GRADERS GRADUATE DARE

After a year of self-esteem building and encouragement to refuse drugs and
alcohol, Craig Intermediate School's sixth-grade class has graduated the
Craig Police Department DARE program.

The DARE (Drug Awareness Resistance Education) class is part of the health
curriculum at the intermediate school, and it is taught by Carolyn Wade and
Jesse McAvoy, school resource officers, and Deputy Liz Campbell, a member
of the detention staff at the Public Safety Center.

It's a common misconception that the program is just an anti-drug lecture,
Wade said. DARE provides students the opportunity to have positive
interactions with police officers, and much of the curriculum is based on
raising students' self-esteem as a proactive measure against drug use.

"It enables us to interact with the kids. We talk about how to stand tall
and the eight ways to say no," Campbell said.

Often, Wade said she doesn't find out what kind of impact the program has
had on a student until after the class has ended, and parents come to tell
her what sort of effect the class has had on their children.

This year, essay awards were presented to Shelby Haughey and Katherine
Cork, who wrote on what they learned in the class and how it affected them.

Cork wrote about smoking, and Haughey wrote a wide-ranging essay that
mentioned how the class had made her more aware of how she carried herself.
DARE increased her self-confidence and taught her to be more aware of her
surroundings, she wrote.

"It's not something you do just as a sixth-grader. You do this for the rest
of your life," Campbell said.

Children who carry themselves with confidence are less likely to be offered
drugs, Wade said. Students are encouraged to associate with others who
share similar viewpoints, and they are taught that though some people
drink, smoke or do drugs, it isn't the norm.

To graduate from the DARE program, students are required to participate in
class, write an essay and incur no drug, tobacco or alcohol violations
during the course of the year.

Parents have the option to sign their children out of the DARE class, and
some parents have taken that option, sometimes based on the mistaken belief
that the school resources officers are in the classroom to gather
information on students' families. In class, students are instructed to
say, "I know someone," to protect family members' confidentiality, Wade
said. The police will act only on a student's information if the student
has implied they will injure themselves or if the information involves
child abuse, Wade said.

In the elementary schools, DARE focuses primarily on safety. Wade said the
police department is hoping to implement a DARE program soon in the middle
school.