SURVEY: DRINKING, POT USE ON RISE IN SCHOOL

TEMECULA -- As the afternoon exodus from Temecula Valley High School begins,
hundreds of students pour out the front gate, passing beneath an arching
sign that reads: "Decisions made today affect the rest of your life."

Some may be missing the message, however.

The results of anonymous polling of students on risk behavior in both the
Temecula Valley Unified and Lake Elsinore Unified school districts show
continued drug use by a significant number of teenagers, including more than
a third of all 11th-graders surveyed. Murrieta students did not take the
most recent risk-behavior survey.

And nearly a quarter of all 11th-graders surveyed admitted to binge drinking
within the last 30 days.

Both districts have conducted two of the California Department of
Education-funded surveys over the past four years. The Healthy Kids Survey
asks students about their use of drugs and alcohol. The questionnaires,
developed by San Francisco-based nonprofit WestEd, are completed by students
in the majority of school districts in the state, a spokeswoman for that
organization said.

And although the numbers in most cases remain below state averages and there
have been some decreases in specific categories, some of the highlights of
those reports show continued widespread student use of both alcohol and
marijuana, with significant increases in some areas, much to the chagrin of
parents and school officials.

Lake Elsinore Marijuana Use

In the case of Lake Elsinore Unified, for example, the number of seventh-
and ninth-graders who said they had smoked marijuana on campus within the
last 30 days went respectively from 3 percent and 6 percent in a spring 2000
survey to 5 percent and 8 percent in a fall 2001 survey. But for
11th-graders, the number doubled from one survey to the next, going from 4
percent of respondents to 8 percent.

Meanwhile, current use of marijuana on campus statewide was unchanged over
the previous year at 3 percent of seventh-graders, 6 percent of
ninth-graders and 8 percent of 11th-graders.

The number of Lake Elsinore Unified students who said they had smoked
marijuana at least once in their life increased from 5 percent of
seventh-grade respondents to 9 percent, while for 11th-graders, the increase
was from 35 percent to 43 percent. However, the number of ninth-grade
students who said they have smoked marijuana at least once decreased from 25
percent to 19 percent.

That compares with statewide averages showing no growth year over year. In
2001 in the same category, use was stable over the previous year at 4
percent of seventh-graders, 24 percent for ninth-graders and 44 percent of
11th-graders.

A combined total of more than 1,300 seventh-, ninth- and 11th-graders
completed the survey in 2001.

A Temescal Canyon High School student says she believes the numbers and that
parents should be concerned, but that it would extremely difficult to turn
the tide.

"It's not like you can really change it," said Katie Rodriguez, 14. "Peer
pressure is so hard -- other people say you got to do it and it's hard to
say no."

Local drug counselor Rocky Hill, director of Hill Alcohol & Drug Treatment
in Temecula, said that while peer pressure is a factor, teenagers choose
which peer group they will hang out with.

"That kid has made a decision to select that group for whatever reason, and
it might be because that group parties and does drugs," he said.

Katie said she believes the school district is doing everything it can to
stop children from using drugs, but to no avail. "Sometimes, the harder you
try, the more it makes people want to do it," she said.

The grandparent of a Temescal Canyon student said he is very concerned about
student use of drugs. Milton Hobbs, 73, drops his granddaughter off and
picks her up from school every day.

"(The survey) tells me parents don't give a damn," he said. "They don't give
a damn how they dress and don't give a damn what they do; they just let them
run wild."

The district recognizes the problem, said Donna Dalton Opoku-Agyeman, the
district's director of child welfare and attendance.

"The level of concern is as high as can be expressed," she said, adding that
the issue reaches far beyond the fences of local campuses.

"It's a reflection of the societal problem," she said. "Many think there is
nothing wrong with marijuana use; we are battling that."

Some of the measures the district are taking to fight the problems of drug
and alcohol use by students include: classroom discussion, educating
students as to the consequences if they are caught with drugs in their
possession or on their way to campus, and mandatory drug education and
counseling programs for any student caught, Opoku-Agyeman said.

Temecula Marijuana Use

While Temecula Valley Unified's numbers were all below state averages in the
same categories and showed decreases in some areas, the number of students
who have used marijuana or alcohol was still in the double digits for two of
three grades.

The percentage of seventh-graders saying they had smoked marijuana at least
once in their lifetime held steady from 1999 to 2001 at 5 percent. And while
the percentage of 11th-graders admitting to the behavior grew from 35 to 37
percent, for 9th-graders it dipped from 17 percent to 16 percent.

For marijuana use on school grounds in the past 30 days, the numbers were
unchanged at 2 percent for seventh-graders and 3 percent for ninth-graders.
Eleventh-graders admitting to the same behavior, meanwhile, increased from 4
percent to 6 percent.

Sixteen-year-old Temecula Valley High School student Matt Laster said he is
not surprised by the results of the survey. In fact, he said, he believes
even more teenagers at his school smoke marijuana than admit to it on
surveys.

"It's too easy to get ahold of," he said. "If you know somebody that uses,
then you can get ahold of it pretty easy.

Terry Corrales, mother of both a seventh- and an 11th-grade student, said
she is particularly concerned by the number of students smoking marijuana on
campus.

"It makes me feel like my kids are not safe on campus," she said while
waiting outside the school on a recent afternoon to pick up her children.
"If you can't trust your teachers to properly supervise your students, then
what kind of a society do we live in?"

A spokeswoman for the district said officials there are is in the process of
analyzing the data from the survey, to make the necessary adjustments to its
programs to address the problems.

"We are concerned about every single student in our district and are going
to use the information to make program adjustments as needed," said Diana
Damon-White, who oversees the survey at the district and supervises the
district's Safe Drug, Alcohol and Tobacco education program.

That program gives lessons to students on awareness of the negative effects
on health and life of drug, alcohol and tobacco use, she said.

And school resource officers do interventions and awareness teaching at
several grade levels from grammar school through high school. Teachers also
receive training in recognizing the signs of drug abuse and there are
district community awareness forums for parents, as well, she said.

Counselor Hill, however, said he believes that society in general and school
districts in particular are missing the mark when it comes to what is really
at issue. Interdiction, policing and education have already proved
ineffective, he said.

"If education alone were enough, then we wouldn't have physicians, nurses or
police officers experiencing addiction (to alcohol or drugs), because they
would have seen the devastation firsthand and opted out," Hill said.

He said that rather than focusing on how many students are experimenting
with drugs, officials should be assessing students to ferret out those who
are most at risk for addiction and get those students into counseling.

Binge Drinking On The Rise

Binge drinking behavior by students is on the rise in most grades in both
districts, according to the survey. Experts define binge drinking as
"consuming five drinks in a row, on the same occasion."

In the 2000 survey at Lake Elsinore Unified schools, 5 percent of
seventh-graders, 14 percent of ninth-graders who responded and 19 percent of
11th-graders admitted they binge drank in the past 30 days. In the 2001
survey, those numbers had grown to 9 percent and 25 percent, respectively,
for seventh- and 11th-grade respondents. While the number of ninth-grade
respondents admitting to the behavior decreased to 12 percent.

The studies at Temecula Valley Unified showed increases in the number of
students who binge drank within the past 30 days in two grades and a
decrease in one grade. In the 1999 study, 5 percent respondents in the
seventh grade, 10 percent in the ninth grade and 23 percent in the 11th
grade admitted to the behavior. In the 2001 study, meanwhile, those numbers
had jumped to 4 percent, 12 percent and 24 percent, respectively, for
seventh-, ninth- and 11th-grade respondents.

A combined total of more than 2,600 seventh-, ninth- and 11th-grade students
in the district participated in the survey.

On a statewide level, meanwhile, the numbers for binge drinking in the past
30 days dropped between 1999 and 2001 among seventh-graders from 6 percent
to 3 percent. The numbers remained stable for ninth- and 11th-graders,
however, at 13 percent and 26 percent.

Survey Methodology

In the case of Lake Elsinore Unified's survey, WestEd officials said the
number of students responding to the survey was fewer than desirable -- the
reliability factor being greatest if 60 percent or more of a given grade
level answer the questionnaire -- but still meaningful.

In the most recent Lake Elsinore Unified study, 32 percent of
seventh-graders, 44 percent of ninth-graders and just 18 percent of
11th-graders responded. The district's Opoku-Agyeman said the lower than
expected number of students who responded was because many parents did not
sign the necessary permission slip, authorizing their children to complete
the questionnaire. Data on what percentage of students took the 2000 survey
were not available.

"These numbers are reliable unto themselves, but we didn't capture as many
as we wanted," she said.

In the case of Temecula Valley Unified, the percentage of students who
participated in the survey was as follows: In the 1999 survey, 61 percent of
seventh-graders, 57 percent of ninth-graders and 43 percent of 11th-graders
completed the survey. In the 2001 survey, 66 percent of seventh-graders, 61
percent of ninth-graders and 49 percent of 11th-graders did so.

A state Department of Education spokeswoman said that although she did not
have specific numbers on the margin of error of the study results, the
questionnaires are designed to weed out students who may see them as a lark.

"Questions are built into the test which are cross-referenced, and if
students answer inappropriately on those questions, then we just throw out
the whole test (for that student)," said Meredith Rolfe, administrator of
the Safe and Healthy Kids program with the Department of Education.

* LEUSD TVUSD California:

* 2000 2001 1999 2001 1999 2001

Marijuana Once, Lifetime:

7th: 5, 9 4, 5 8.5, 8.5

9th: 25, 19 16, 16 24, 24

11th: 35, 43 36, 37 44, 44

Marijuana On Campus, 30 Days:

7th: 3, 5 2, 2 3, 3

9th: 6, 8 3, 3 6, 6

11th: 4, 8 4, 6 8, 8

Binge Drinking, 30 Days:

7th: 6, 9 5, 4 10, 6

9th: 14, 12 10, 12 20, 21

11th: 19, 25 23, 24 26, 34

Sources: WestEd, LEUSD, TVUSD