PARENTS, SIT DOWN AND TALK WITH YOUR KIDS

It's a night at the party. There is a new kid in town, and he wants to
quickly fit in with everyone. Some of the "cool kids" pressure him to
take a puff of marijuana.

This is his first party, and he wants to be part of "the group," but
he thinks he has to smoke to achieve that. His parents have worked
hard to instill in him the dangers of drug abuse, but he fears
everyone will look down on him and call him a chicken if he doesn't do
it. It's a battle between learned morals and fitting in. Who wins?

Unfortunately, this incident has become commonplace in high school
behavior and we have to have classes on how to react to it. At some
point, it can be guaranteed that every teenager will have to decide
whether or not to use drugs and alcohol.

But the question that people, especially parents, ask is, "How can we
stop it?"

Most parents have sat down and have a deep talk with their teens about
drug abuse. Beyond any sort of school class, this is probably the most
effective way of getting through to teens. Teens need to be taught not
only the dangers of using drugs, but also have a mutual agreement
about it between their parents and themselves.

If they are faced with the choice, some kids will decide against it
because of fear of betraying their family's values and morals. It's
not simply the fear of being punished. They have truly understood why
drug abuse is wrong.

However, the drug problem is also rampant in high schools across
Edmond. Students come back from lunch with bloodshot eyes and with the
smell of marijuana on themselves, and this needs to be stopped.

But we already have started programs such as "D.A.R.E" and random
checks by the so-called "drug dog." What is wrong with them? These
haven't been so effective, as we can see.

The problem is teens know that drug usage is wrong, yet they still do
it. The "just say no" philosophy doesn't work.

Also, students have found ways to beat the system. Checks by the drug
dogs are always random, but students have learned of ways to get
around this. The dog searches cars in the parking lot and lockers for
drugs, but never searches students, so teens now keep their drugs in
their pockets all the time to avoid being caught.

The best solution would be to keep on surprising the drug abusers. We
can't have one drug-finding program for too long, because the drug
users will eventually find a way around it.

Teenagers are very smart; never underestimate them. Also, one solution
I highly disdain is the use of directly searching students, especially
random door-checks by police officers.

Some believe teens use drugs and alcohol because of low self-esteem;
if this is the case, police officers searching students for drugs will
not help. It will only make matters worse for the struggling teen.

It makes the students, even the ones who don't use drugs, feel like
criminals. If police officers search them everyday as they enter the
school doors, school becomes less a place of learning and more a
prison. Do prisoners generally have high self-esteems? No. So then,
students shouldn't have to be submitted to the same sort of searches
as prisoners are.