taught to reject
drugs, booze,cigs

Michael Becker

News Editor
michacl@nsnews.com

CONSTABLE Harry
McNeil is the quintessen-
tial good cop.

He's got an easy, likeable way
about him and comes across as noth-
ing bur honest. The West Vancouver
police officer is the perfect D.A.R.E.
(Drug Abuse Resistance Education)
instructor. The kids like him.

The D.A.R.E. program began in
the Los Angeles Unified School
District in 1983 as a partnership
between the school district and the
L.A. Police Deparcment. In the
U.S., approximately 75% of school
districts support it as a standard drug
education program. It is taught in 47
countries throughout the world.

The program teaches students
how to recognize and resist peer
pressure to try illegal drugs, alcohol
and tobacco. There are no grey
areas: the message is zero tolerance
regarding the use of any of the sub-
stances,

The D.A.RLE. curriculum was designed by academics to be
taught by police officers. Before entering the D.A.RE. pro-
gram, officers take 80 hours of special training in areas includ-
ing child development, classroom management, teaching tech-
niques and communication skills. An additional 40 hours of
training is required for a D.A.RLE. officer to teach the junior
high curriculum and another 40 hours are needed to teach the
senior high curriculum.

The core curriculum targets children in grades 5 and 6. One
lesson a week is taught over a period of 17 wecks.

D.A.RE. came to West Vancouver school district in 1995.
It’s an expensive program, taking somewhere in the neighbor-
hood of $300,000 a year from the $5.5 million West Vancouver
Police budget. The police like ic and the community seems to
support it. The West Vancouver Foundation spons »s D.A.R.E.
and in. 1996 raised $25,000 for the program at a gala event.

MeNeil, and fellow D.A.R.E, officers Const. [ar Craib and
Const. Rick Catlin dedicate 28 hours a week to the school pro-
gram. Sgt. Jim Almas puts in approximately nwo hours a week.

As of this year, Const. Paul Skelton has been teuching the
program three hours a week at North Vancouver's Norgate
community school. Many of the school’s students come from
the Squamish Nation reserve. For the rest of North Vancouver's
schools, the drug awareness program of choice is the RCMIP's
PACE (Police Assisting Community Education) program.

PACE is a drug education package for grades 5 through 9,
and is meant to foster the relationship between the police and
young people within the community. It supplements other class-
room activity focused on drug prevention.

The popular D.A.R.E. program is not without controversy.
Studies abound supporting its efficacy. Early D.A.R.E. evalua-
tions (1987-1989) in the U.S. were generally favorable, show -
ing decreased alcohol, tobacce and other drug use, an increased
resistance to drug use and an increase in self-esteem.

But over recent years questions and criticisms have surfaced
about the merits of D.A.RE.

AUS, Justice Department-sponsored study by the Research
Triangle Institute notes D.A.R.E. has a “limited to essentially
nonexistent effece on drug use.”

NEWS photo Terry Peters

WEST Vancouver Police Const. Marry McNeil
(above) addresses a D.A.R.E. class at St.
Anthony’s school. Caroline Arbuckle (photo
right) raises her hand at Caulfeitd elementary to
answer a question about the D.A.R.E. program.

The US. General
Accounting Office reports,
“There is little evidence so far
that D.A.R.E. and other ‘resis-
tance training’ programs have
reduced the use of drugs by
adolescents.”

West Vancouver
stand by the anecdotal evi-
dence, convinced that
D.A.R.E. is a positive force in
the community,

McNeil said that the police
department is looking — at
D.A.R.E. programs in other
jurisdictions that have been
able to quantify the success of
DARE.

“We'll be picking one this
summer and we'll be putting it
into effect this school vear to
measure the success rate of the
program — nor only by smiles,
we can also take a look at num-
bers. Numbers seem to carry
weight,” he said.

It’s a Friday morning in
May. McNeil walks into the
classroom at St. Anthony's

olic private school on
Keith Road. Fourteen Grade 7 students are gathered in a class-
room ready for the second one-hour D.A.R.E. lesson of the

Decorative native dream catchers hang from the ceiling. On
one wall there’s a poster of John Paul IP in prayer. A D E
poster brightens a door. “D.A.R.E. to lead,” it says. It shows
some penguins on an ice float. One jumps off, ahead of the

ack.
P The kids are neat and polite. The class stands and says good
morning to MeNcil as he joins them.

Mother questions program

BOWEN Island resident Deborah
Kirby’s daughter participated in the
D.A.RE. pro . Her child’s experi-
ence brought her to question the effort:
On Wednesday, May 13 (1998) my
daughter graduated from the D.A.RE.
Program. :

Just a few weeks earlier my daughter
was excited when she told me that her
teacher would be choosing the people
who would read their D.A.RE. essa
the assembly, She later told me hers had
been selected.

She was very proud. The day before
the ceremony, she practiced in front of the
principal. This morning, she invited me to
hear her read. Her name was on the pro-

m distributed at the door.

Shortly before the ceremony began my
daughter was informed by the D.A.RE.
constable that she could not read her

» It was unacceptable; it might lead to
nderstanding. No. staff intervened.
We expected some acknowledgment, It

did not come. We listened to 13 class-
mates read their paeans celebrating
DARE.

My daughter wrote in brief, Grade 5
hyperbole that D.A.R.E. was a good pro-
gram. She also wrote that marijuana has
positive in society, that it is used to
treat glaucoma, and ¢ase the g
chemo and AIDS patients. She actually
juxtaposed the words “wonderful” and
“drug.”

For her di nto think beyond mere

What a great lesson.
fs the D.A.RLE. program a good one?
On the surface it seems to be, we all want
our children to be able to resist peer pres-
sure, to have a better understanding of the
sof drugs, alcohol and tobacco and
tu meet and interact with police officers in
a positive way. But there are serious flaws

suffering of

in this program.

It is predicated on the assumption that
children cannot reason. Ir dictates intor-
mation and does not allow for al dis-
cussion. The program is delivered by
police to students with no input from
teachers, no assessment of student work,
no evaluation of teaching ability.

It was developed and is wholly con-
trolled by a business enterprise worth close
to $750,000,000 U.S. based in Los
Angeles. No alterations to fit the n of
a school, district, community are permit-
ted without authorization from head
office.

The D.A.RCE. Program costs the West
Vancouver taxpayer somewhere in’ the
order of $300,000 a vear. 1 suggest this
sun would go a long way towards devel-
oping a program tailor-made for our
schools — one that would reflect our val-
ues and mores and, most importantly, one
that begins with the premise that our chil-
dren are thinking people.

“pain

Sunday, August 16, 1998 — North Shore News - 3

olerance

“What day ts it today?” he asks,
“Its DAR.

Day!" they shout
back fervently.

And then it’s D.A.R.E. box time.
MeNeil responds to questions left by
the children. He uses the D.A.R.E.
session to talk about more than sub-
stance abuse. He does not shy away
from breader is F crime and
punishment — law, ms, the role
of police in the community.

A note from the box: “What's the
difference between a policeman in
the U.S. and in Canada?”

McNeil tells them it’s more con-
servative in Canada and that there is
more violence and poverty to con-
tend with in the States. “In Canada
we don’t have ghettos. We have
street peaple here but street people
choose to be street people. With
drug abuse (in Canada) a lot of kids
are wondering what it’s all about.

“They're not using drugs to to
escape life in a ghetto where life is
ceally crummy. Life is pretty goud

- here in West Vancouver.”
he class watches a
D.A.RE. video. They see a
cartoon character with a
joint in hand and a goofy
look on his face standing in
the middle of traffic.

Jose and Sandy are
accosted by a guy who
offers crack, cocaine, speed,
acid, crystal and crank. The
cartoon druggies have
green skin and fad teeth.

MeNcil tells the kids that
taarijuana is a “gateway”

' drug. “If you were ro try it

. you might like it, but it isn’t
worth the gamble There is
No good ume to try mari-
juana,” McNeil says.

The constable reviews
some homework. McNeil
asks one boy if he can talk
about the possible risk of
long-term tobacco use.

He asks another what
the possible risk might be of
using marijuana once. The
boy responds, saying he
could be expelled from
school and find trouble with ©
his parents and the police.

Another is asked about
the possible risk of using
cocaine. The child answers

* quickly: paranoia.

While zero tolerance

remains the wperative con-
. = cept, McNeil acknowledges
NEWS photo Mike Wekefleld = thar some children will
come into class with different information. What if some child
had heard that marijuana has some beneficial uses for glaucoma
and pain relief’ How would he address such thinking?

Said McNeil: “We have to recognize that it is being used in
some places for cases where people have terminal cancer. In a
Grade 5 class we're not there to discuss terminal cancer. There
are synthetic drugs that are on the market that will give the same
relief and they don’t have the side effects that marijuana has, like

ty

See Program page &

) Samat ger
a people. with: glaucoma’ t
pressure. behind the, ¢ Me ae a
-_ Drugs and alcoh ‘ul

“a drag that. can dam

5. Mati