Wednesday, February 6, 2008

Southlake-Carroll ISD educates parents about drug abuse

By Brody Mulligan of Brody Blog

Parents of students in extracurricular activities are required to complete online "Substance Abuse Awareness Training" before their children are eligible for participation, according to official press releases and student handbooks distributed by the Southlake-Carroll Independent School District.

The prerequisite in this small, money-laden suburb (Pop. 21,519) exceeds requirements set by the Texas Education Association for participation in school-sponsored activities, such as band, choir, and--of course--sports.

Texas law requires that a student be in good academic standing and keep within an allowance of unexcused absences in order to participate in interscholastic activities, but stops short of requiring that parents be educated about illegal drug use and underage drinking.

Combined with searches for contraband by drug-sniffing dogs, random student-athlete drug testing, and student drug education programs that begin in elementary school, the parental education curriculum aims to preempt overdose and addiction epidemics that continue to plague schools in the 12-county Dallas-Fort Worth-Arlington metropolitan area.

With little regulation from State or Federal agencies, each district is left to tailor and mold its own drug testing and education policy, navigating the narrow road leading to a balance between budgets, politics, and rates and risks for abuse.

Debate among drug testing in public schools has reached the United States Supreme Court, which, in its most decisive and recent ruling on the subject, said that students participating in extracurricular activities have a reasonable expectation of a loss of privacy, such as with athletes in locker rooms, and found drug testing programs do not violate a student's constitutional rights.

No argument may be needed here, with a high school parking lot that, teachers joke, has better, newer, and more expensive cars than the faculty lot; where students have access to money and often learn about how to abuse over-the-counter, prescription, and narcotic drugs--ironically--on the internet.

In the 1990s, the North Dallas suburb of Plano, a similarly affluent, predominately white bedroom community was stunned by the deaths of several students caused by heroin, a drug normally associated with inner-city life.

And while recent studies suggest that teenage drug use is down, evidence exists that--especially in affluent areas--the drug trade is alive and well. Recently Thomas Crutsinger was sentenced to eight years in prison after being convicted of supplying and selling ecstasy and prescription drugs to students of a nearby school district. Prior to his arrest, Mr. Crutsinger was on the Grapevine-Southlake Soccer Association's board of directors.

A junior at Carroll Senior High School, who requested his name be withheld from publication for fear of disciplinary or retaliatory action, said drugs were readily available in most social circles, especially highlighting the availability of prescription drugs like Xanax.

He admitted to having an addiction to the painkiller oxycontin that, at times, cost him hundreds of dollars a month. He added "when I first started doing it, I didn't know much about it...how to use it, and which [pill] was which"

"But then, I went online."

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