Drugs Seeping Into More Schools

Twenty-eight percent of middle-school-student respondents reported that drugs are used, kept or sold at their schools, a 47 percent jump since 2002, according to the 10th annual teen survey by Columbia’s National Center on Addiction and Substance Abuse. The number of high schoolers saying drugs are at their schools rose 41 percent in the last three years, to 62 percent, the survey said. CASA*August 18, 2005

Drugs Seeping Into More Schools

Meanwhile, the survey found teens who viewed drugs as morally wrong were significantly less likely to try them, as were those who felt their parents would be “extremely upset” to discover drug use. The report found that teens who confided in their parents were at much lower risk of drug abuse than teens who turn first to another adult. “If this survey does anything, it really shouts to parents: You cannot outsource your responsibility to law enforcement or the schools,” Califano said. “I think when parents feel as strongly about drugs in the schools as they do about asbestos in the schools, we’ll start getting the drugs out of the schools.” CASA*August 18, 2005