Are schools "drug-infested"?

A NEW STUDY FROM THE NATIONAL Center on Addiction and Substance Abuse (CASA) at Columbia University is calling U.S. middle and high schools "drug-infested," while at the same time other major studies point to an overall de cline in teen drug use.

The CASA survey found that 80 percent of those attending high school and 44 percent of those attending middle school had personally witnessed on school grounds illegal drug use, dealing, or possession and/ or students high or drunk.

But Steve Pasierb, president of the nonprofit Partnership for a Drug-Free America, is not sure that "drug-infested" is the right way to describe U.S. schools. "Students tend to overestimate the availability and peer usage of illegal drugs in schools," he says. "It's actually the parents that highly underestimate drug use among their children."

He adds that if a high school has, say, two students who are well-known pot smokers, most other students are going to know about them and the kinds of activity they engage in. "But does that mean the school is infested?" he asks.

Other national studies released last year by the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration (SAMHSA) and Monitoring the Future at the University of Michigan reflect a picture of drug use in schools that Pasierb says is a much more accurate assessment.

[ILLUSTRATION OMITTED]

The SAMHSA report found less than 10 percent of 12- to 17-year-olds in 2005 used drugs within the previous month (down from nearly 12 percent in 2002), and Michigan's study noted overall declines, including marijuana use, in 2006.

Pasierb agrees that there has been a steady decline in teen drug use over the past seven years and that the students who do use might have different motivations than those of previous generations. Where in the past students might have used drugs as an outlet for having fun and "curbing boredom," Pasierb says that in today's culture many students are so involved with extracurricular and academic activities that unfortunately some might turn to drugs just to take the edge off.

Others insist there is a problem through and through. Joseph Califano Jr., founder of QEV Analytics, the research firm that conducted the CASA study, says, "We clearly have a drug culture in most of the country's high schools and a significant proportion of the middle schools."

Percentage of Students Ages 12 to 17 Who
Have Witnessed the Following at School:

Student Drug Possession    48
Drug Dealing               18
Students High on Drugs     43
Students Drunk             29 *

* Figures exceed 100 percent as students
responded yes to more than one occurrence.

Source: National Center on Addiction and
Substance Abuse