Pubdate: Mon, 14 Jan 2013 Source: Columbus Dispatch (OH) Copyright: 2013 The Columbus Dispatch Contact: http://www.dispatch.com/ Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/93 Author: Lindsay Friedman SCHOOLS SAY NO TO OLD DRUG PROGRAMS Realizing that more young people are no longer "just saying no" to drugs, local schools are changing their approaches to drugprevention programs. Districts such as Westerville, Pickerington, Bexley, Dublin and Hamilton now offer drug counseling as an alternative to suspension or expulsion for students caught using drugs. Since the loss of federal funding for schools' prevention efforts in 2009, officials are discovering that DARE and zero-tolerance policies are no longer enough, said Greg Viebranz, the spokesman for Westerville schools. Westerville is building relationships with anti-drug groups and referring students who use drugs to counselors. Pickerington also is offering counseling. "We can't be naive; we aren't going to tell you to just say no," said Zach Howard, the principal at Pickerington Central High School. "It's not about punishing students; it's about helping them make better, well-informed decisions." Inspired by a program in Dublin, Bexley is hiring what it calls a student and community specialist to strengthen relationships among students, parents and teachers. "The program will not get it done by itself, but what it will show is that we are paying attention to the whole child (not just their academic status)," Bexley Superintendent Mike Johnson said. "But, we can't do it alone." The changes cannot come soon enough for the parents of Tyler Campbell, who died of an overdose in 2011. Tyler was a 2007 graduate of Pickerington North High School with a scholarship to play football at the University of Akron. After he sustained a number of injuries requiring prescription drugs, he developed an addiction. "Tyler was a normal suburban kid," said Wayne Campbell, Tyler's father. "This could happen to truly anyone, and it's happened to a lot of good people. No one is exempt." Inspired by their son's struggles, the family created Tyler's Light, a drug prevention program that works to change the way schools, including Westerville schools, approach substance abuse. "It needs to be updated, upgraded and more in tune for what's out there and more in tune for high school students," Mr. Campbell said. The year before Tyler's death, the Ohio Department of Health reported a record 1,544 accidental drug-overdose deaths, reflective of a 39 percent rise in prescription-drug abuse. Though the number of kids smoking cigarettes and drinking has significantly dropped in recent years, the rate of young people using prescription drugs such as Adderall and Vicodin remains high at 14.8 percent, according to the National Institute on Drug Abuse. The institute also reported that the number of high-school seniors reporting regular marijuana use increased by 1.4 percent and occasional use by 5.9 percent. The last time specialists saw such a high percentage of kids using drugs was in the early 1980s, said Dr. Wilson Compton, the director of the division of epidemiology, services and prevention research at the National Institute on Drug Abuse. "It certainly surprised me, and it's a concern," he said. Dr. Lloyd Johnston, a senior research scientist at the University of Michigan and the principal research investigator of the annual Monitoring the Future study of youth drug use, said the upswing in drug abuse is concerning because adolescents are more likely to become dependent on drugs and early drug use can cause a lapse in brain development. Use of gateway drugs such as marijuana can lead to use of more-dangerous illicit or prescription drugs. Pot has become three to 10 times more potent compared with the drug 15 to 20 years ago, he said. In addition, the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences reported an association between early marijuana use and a decline in IQ by about eight points after following more than 1,000 young marijuana users into adulthood. Though these studies were conducted before the recent legalization of marijuana in Colorado and Washington, the popularity of pot and prescription drugs is nothing new, said Dr. Steve Matson, a professor of pediatrics at Ohio State University and director of the Opiate Addiction Clinic at Nationwide Children's Hospital. "We are in one of those cycles, for a while (kids) think it's bad for them, and then for a while, they don't," Matson said. "At this point, (the gradual increase) does have something to do with all these stories of states legalizing (marijuana), because if you can, then it must be safe." - --- MAP posted-by: Jo-D