Pubdate: Tue, 01 Nov 2001 Source: Blade, The (OH) Copyright: 2001 The Blade Contact: http://www.toledoblade.com/ Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/48 Author: Larry P. Vellequette Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/dare.htm (D.A.R.E.) BEDFORD 'DARES' TO ENTER PROGRAM Junior High Part Of National Test To Examine Plan's Effectiveness TEMPERANCE - Bedford Junior High School's seventh graders will become lab rats of sorts early next year as part of a national experiment to try to improve the effectiveness of the long-running DARE program. Bedford is the only school in Monroe County participating in the project sponsored by the University of Akron's Institute for Health and Social Policy to improve the Drug Awareness and Resistance Education curriculum. In addition to updating the long-taught anti-drug messages of DARE, the study will measure the effectiveness over a five year period of teaching the curriculum in seventh, rather than fifth grade, and of going over the material again in the ninth grade. "There's some research out there that says the DARE program is less than effective, and what this [study] is an attempt to rewrite the DARE curriculum for older students," Jon White, Bedford's assistant superintendent of curriculum and student services, said. "Peer pressure really kicks in around the seventh grade, so it makes more sense to catch kids when that pressure kicks in than when they're younger," Mr. White said. Bedford was selected randomly out of the Detroit Metropolitan area as one of 80 high schools and 176 "feeder" middle schools in the country to participate in the Adolescent Substance Abuse Prevention Study, underwritten by a $13.7 million grant from the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation. Half of the participating districts will be given the new curriculum to try, while the other half will continue to teach the DARE program as they already have as part of a control group. Students in all the districts will be surveyed each year from 7th to 12th grade about their drug and alcohol usage, and the results compared to determine if the new curriculum is having any measurable effect. Despite decades worth of trying - the real effectiveness of the DARE program , which is taught each year across Monroe County by local law enforcement agencies - may be suspect. According to a 2000 report from the University of Michigan that measures drug use among middle and high school students nationally, half have at least tried an illicit substance by the time they finish high school. The same report claims that nearly 25 percent of the students surveyed claim to use marijuana regularly. "This is really the next generation in school-based substance abuse and violence prevention programming, coupled with the most effective delivery system, the DARE program," said Jessica Nickel, a spokeswoman for the University of Akron's Institute for Health and Social Policy. "We drew from the most successful prevention programs to design [the new curriculum]." Mr. White said Bedford has enthusiastically embraced the fifth grade DARE program "for 15 or 20 years, as long as there's been a DARE program." The annual DARE graduation, he said, has become an annual social event for the community. But while the district was happy with the current curriculum, it was excited about being chosen to try and help improve its performance. "The reason we're participating in the study is we want to find out if the seventh grade is more effective. If this proves to be a better way of intervening, then we're right there on the cutting edge," Mr. White said. But there is at least one problem that participating in the pilot program has posed: with the district's resources concentrating on the seventh grade class, the fifth grade DARE program will have to be suspended. "The problem is that the manpower is so short in the sheriff's department, we have to suspend the fifth grade program in order to be able to man the seventh grade program. But we felt this study was important enough that we needed to participate," Mr. White said. - --- MAP posted-by: Rebel