FUTURE OF DARE PROGRAM IN SPRUCE GROVE UNCERTAIN

The Spruce Grove DARE (Drug Abuse Resistance Education) program will lose
its coordinator on Aug. 7 with the retirement of Ray Boudreau.

He implemented the program upon his arrival in the city in 1996.

"There's been around 800 Grade 6 students that I've put through the DARE
program here in Spruce Grove," he said.

"The future of the DARE program is very much in the air now."

Because of the nature of the program, the coorinator's position is not an
easy one to fill. The next coordinator must have experience with the
program's curriculum, as well as the willingness to put in a great deal of
time.

"It's time consuming; it's a big commitment for police officers," Boudreau
said. The program requires about 17 hours of the officer's time, per class.

"We've requested an officer who has been DARE-trained to replace him," said
Corp. Bruce James, Boudreau's supervisor.

Boudreau assured the public that, "if that does not happen, I have some
ideas on how we can make this program go for another couple of years."

The program, which targets youngsters, is set up to arm them with
decision-making skills in relation to drugs, alcohol, and the pressures of
teen life.

It is about "the decision-making process, to know they have rights, they
don't have to be bullied, they don't have to do things just because their
friends are doing them," stated Boudreau.

"It's probably one of the first early intervention programs that I've come
across that deals with life skills issues at the level the Grade 6 students
are at.

"It's something they continue to have through their whole life, and the
pressures don't go away. They change but they don't go away."

The Parkland School Division highly values the program and wants to see it
continue.

"Our board recently wrote letters to the Governor General expressing our
appreciation for the program and encouraging that it be better funded,"
said Jeanette Smith, chair of the PSD board of education.

"If the DARE program were to be discontinued in the Grove it would be an
incredible loss to our system."

The program began in Chicago and New York in the late 1970s and has been
running every year since in schools across North America.