THE TRAGEDY OF RACHEL

A 22-Minute Video That Gave Pupils A Shock Lesson In Drug Use

"If anyone ever pushed me to take drugs then I would think back to
that picture, of her dead on the floor looking like that," said George
Thompson, 14, gesturing at the television screen behind him.

"It just shows what can happen," added 14-year-old Anthony Humphrey.
"Taking drugs is not just about having a good time. I'm not sure what
happened to her arms, they'd gone all black, I don't know if that's
what happens when you take heroin but it makes you think." His voice
tailed off as he recalled the image of the dead girl.

It was Monday afternoon and the class of 14- and 15-year-olds at John
Masefield High School in Ledbury, Herefordshire, had just become the
first pupils to use a controversial new anti-drugs video in a drugs
education lesson.

Called Rachel's Story, it is about Rachel Whitear, a girl only eight
years the pupils' senior who also grew up in Hereford, just 15 miles
away, and left school for Bath University.

But this was not going to be an uplifting careers lesson about a local
girl made good. It is a hard-hitting anti-drugs video which includes
disturbing pictures of Rachel's corpse.

Rachel died of a heroin overdose aged 21 in May 2000 and her body lay
undiscovered for three days. Her story became part of the national
debate about drugs education when her parents released the shocking
police photographs of their daughter's blackened and crumpled body.

The photos showed Rachel slumped forward on the floor with the syringe
that she had used to administer her fatal last dose still in her hand.
Rachel's parents allowed the images to be included in the video,
saying they wanted to warn other young people how taking drugs could
wreck their lives.

Given the publicity surrounding the 22-minute video, it was not
surprising that many of the 28 14- and 15-year-olds in yesterday's
lesson appeared apprehensive and subdued as Ann Duff, the school's
deputy head and drugs education expert, prepared to start the film.

The film may have had extra poignancy for them as both Rachel's
parents used to work at their school - her stepfather Mick Holcroft
as caretaker and her mother Pauline as a classroom assistant - and
the couple still live in the town.

The story started with images from Rachel's seemingly idyllic middle
class childhood - pictures of her posing with a puppy, playing the
piano, laughing in a swim suit and hugging her stepfather.

But as it charted Rachel's descent into heroin addiction the students
were totally absorbed in her story. Some put their hands over their
mouths or faces as if in disbelief. When it ended - after six
seconds of shots of the photos taken by the police who found her body
- - there was a stunned silence which lasted at least a couple of
minutes. Most of the class appeared moved while one or two wiped their
eyes.

When Miss Duff restarted the lesson by going around the room asking
each student for their immediate comments on the video, several simply
expressed the shock they felt at the sight of the pictures.

Louise Newby, 14, said: "It was horrible when they showed those
pictures. It was such a shock.''

"I thought it was scary, really," added 14-year-old Carol
Homer.

But the students were divided over whether Rachel's Story held any
lessons for them. Some simply could not imagine being 21 and facing
the choices Rachel had to deal with.

Kate Browning, 14, said: "Because she was 21 and we do not have any
experience of going through that age it's not really something that we
can relate to." But her classmate Danielle Hawkins disagreed saying:
"I think that anybody can relate to her story because we all have
choices." But what united them was their complete amazement that
someone with 10 GCSE passes and offers of places at six universities
should have become a heroin addict.

Rachel became a drug user after she started dating an older boy just
after her 18th birthday. Her parents later discovered her boyfriend
was a heroin user. She took up a place at Bath but dropped out after
her first term and moved to the Devon bedsit where she was found dead.

Tom Ivey, 15, said: "We are just starting out on our GCSEs and
thinking what we're going to do with our lives. Here is someone with
ten GCSEs - now to us that's really quite an impressive number -
who just threw it all away. Those GCSEs are just gone. She won't do
anything with them now."

Critics of the video have questioned whether it heralds a return to
using shock tactics in drugs education. They argue that young people
need the straight facts about drugs rather than the "Just Say No" and
"Heroin Screws You Up" campaigns.

They have also queried whether middle-class Rachel is representative
of a heroin user after a recent study showed that only two per cent of
16- to 18 year-olds had used heroin compared to 16 per cent of
disadvantaged youngsters of this age group who live in hostels.

Others argue that children are now more streetwise and more likely to
be exposed to drugs than adults appreciate. A recent Government study
recently concluded that almost one in three 15-year-olds had tried
illegal drugs.

The Department for Education and Skills is to make Rachel's Story
available to all children from 10 upwards as part of a new anti-drugs
initiative in schools.

It will be used in 20 Herefordshire schools from next week and in
schools across the country from next year. Liam Kernan,
Herefordshire's drugs education officer, who compiled the teaching
pack which accompanies the video, denies that Rachel's story uses
shock tactics and argues that there is much more to the video that a
couple of disturbing photographs.

He said: "I have seen that video coming up for 100 times and it never
fails to move me.

"Shock tactics do not work. I know that. We are definitely not saying
if you do heroin you will end up lying dead on the floor looking like
this. But we felt that including the police pictures of Rachel added
something and told you how her story really ended. It's just six
seconds in a 22-minute video. We knew that it was a slightly shocking
element but there are lots of other elements in there.''

Miss Duff, the teacher who allowed The Independent to sit in on her
lesson yesterday, agreed that seeing the video in one sitting could be
shocking. The school plans to show Rachel's Story over three weeks to
lessen the shock and give students more time to discuss the issues.
She said: "There is just so much within this video. It's like an onion
with layers. I have seen it four times myself now and each time you
see something different.

"Ideally you need to show it a little bit at a time. You have to give
students time to reflect, assimilate and question what they have seen.

"I feel very strongly that this is a very powerful video that has got
to be used in a responsible way. That means not just playing the tape
and raising all these issues in students' minds just before the bell
goes and sending them off without proper discussion of what they are
feeling."

Chris Tweedale, the headteacher, agreed: "As long as the video is used
sensitively and not as a shock tactic and used as part of an ongoing
personal and social education programme, then I believe it will be a
very useful part of our curriculum."