TO SAVE YOUNGSTERS FROM DRUG USE, ALL MUST BE INVOLVED

Last Friday I fell into the gap. Not the one where they sell khakis, but
the one that makes you feel old and oblivious of what's cool nowdays -- a
generation gap. This story begins with a fun school trip to Orlando that my
13-year-old daughter attended with her eighth-grade class.

She departed at 5 a.m. with the school bus, arrived at 9 a.m. at Universal
Studios, and no later than 11 a.m., I got a call from one of the school
officials.

"Yes, ma'am, your daughter and two others were caught smoking marijuana at
Universal Studios. They had 11 joints with them."

Needless to say, I needed a forklift to lift my jaw off the floor. However,
if you think this is another story about a naive parent who discovers that
her son or daughter smokes pot, you're wrong.

I'll skip the part where I tell you that this kid is exceptionally
intelligent, and that all her teachers and peers love her. That will make
me sound like a proud mother, and right now I'm just furious. The real
killer here is not my personal battle with acceptance of teen marijuana
use. It's the circumstances that surround this whole incident.

We can toss blame all day between the music they listen to, the friends,
the neighborhood, the parents. But in reality. the way a teenager's mind
works is quite simple. If smoking pot is cool, it ticks off parents and the
school, and to top it off, it's accessible -- so why not?

We can preach all day. We can censor some trash that they see on TV, but
you can't fight the rap music and Internet or just lock these kids in a
room until they are 18. Wait, there's a thought ...

The neighborhood? C'mon, we live in Weston. According to the Broward County
School Board Web site, this community has "grade A" schools. Not to mention
the illusion of living in an upscale suburb. In the inner cities you can
cite the hardships, but suburban youth also have something to escape from
- -- boredom.

So basically the only thing a parent can do is hope her kid doesn't have
ambitions to be popular, hear the music but not listen to the words, watch
Buffy and The Disney Channel, and not rebel.

So let's get real, face the music (well, as long as it's not Tupac). The
only solution to deter teens from smoking pot is to make it unavailable.

You all know that there are drugs in schools, but how many people think
middle and elementary school? This is the real issue: How far are we going
to lower the threshold before we speak up?

Through my own personal little nightmare, I learned more than I think I
wanted to about how organized the little angels are. Kids smoking outside
the portable classrooms, inside the bathrooms, distributing in class and
not only the eighth-graders, but seventh- and sixth-graders as well. It has
become common at this stage of their lives, just as if they were swapping a
peanut butter sandwich for bologna.

Is it me, or is it just insane that I expect that when a 13-year-old girl
is brought to school grounds that I should not worry about her? Can we not
rely on the school system to patrol its own turf? Is it too hard to bring
K-9 dogs to sniff bags and lockers and to allow random drug testing?

I have heard debates about how these policing policies step on the
Constitution, interfering with civil rights, privacy and
freedom...whatever. For all those people who support that kind of nonsense,
let's hear what they have to say once they fall into the gap.

The author is a resident of Weston.