OUT of 23 post schools in Co Tipperary, at least one pupil from each school claims to have taken an illegal drug in his or her lifetime. The figure, from a survey conducted by the Garda Research Unit, has leg the unit to conclude that post primary schools in the county are failing to provide adequate drugs related education.
A separate survey by Cormac O'Keeffe, a journalism student at DCU, revealed that more than 40 per cent of 86 ecstasy users in Dublin, Cork and Waterford admitted taking esctasy at least once a week. The people questioned ranged in age from 14 to 28 and 45 of them were school children. Some 33 per cent said they took it once a month, while the remainder said they took it less often.
Garda Inspector Joe Delaney, who monitors and develops the Garda schools' programme, explains that generally "heroin is only in Dublin. Basically when you go out the country your are talking about ecstasy and cannabis.
The issue of substance misuse among young people and the need for interaction between the school, community and parents was highlighted at a recent EU conference in Dublin organised by the Departments of Education and Health with support from the European Commission. Over two days delegates from all over Europe discussed how best to educate young people on the dangers of drugs, tobacco and alcohol.
The keynote speaker, Vivienne Evans, from Britain's Advisory Council on Alcohol and Drug Education TACADE, supports a comprehensive behavourial approach to drug education. There is the "scare them to death" approach or the "just give me the facts, ma'am" approach, she says. Some people feel that young people are going to take drugs anyway because it's just part of the culture.
Drug education must embrace all substances, says Evans. It must be placed within a broad curriculum dealing with personal and social development. Studies of life skill approaches were encouraging, she told the conference.
"There is a whole debate around this issue," she explains. "It may be a relevant strategy for certain individuals and target groups, but it's only one strategy and needs to fit within a broad educational model concerned with meeting young people's needs. Anyway, is it possible to adopt a harm minimisation policy for all drugs. The first use of solvents can cause death - no harm minimisation there."
THE Garda survey highlighted the years between IS and 17 as a critical time for intervention. "Prior to age 17 subjects are not drinking more than would be expected," the unit reports.
But out of 470 respondents in the Tipperary schools, 22 per cent reported having taken one or more illegal drugs, according to the findings. Eleven students (2.4 per cent)
claimed to be regular users of cannabis. Apart from inhalents, cannabis is the most commonly used drug with 12 per cent saying they had used it. This was followed by hallucinogens (7 per cent) and esctasy (3 per cent).
Most students, it seems, do not view illegal drugs in a favourable light. The survey, which was a random and representative sample of all types of schools from the county also revealed poor knowledge of the effects of drugs - and the respondents did not show a great knowledge of the cost of drugs.
Despite the fact that most acquire the drugs from friends, peer pressure was not one of the principal reasons for taking drugs. The most frequently quoted reasons for taking drugs were "curiosity" (68 per cent) and "fun" (58 per cent).
"While the absolute number of young people using drugs, both legal and illegal, in Co Tipperary can never be determined, this study provides a relative gauge of the current situation," says the Garda unit. According to Cormac O'Keeffe's survey, the age at which young people are beginning to take ecstasy has fallen as low as 13. Last year, he says, 414 people attended Dublin's main treatment clinic because of ecstasy, 309 for the first time. In 1991 the clinic had no such cases at all.
Inspector Delaney is confident that drugs "would not be a problem in schools". The Garda schools' programme, an education programme about crime and personal safety which targets 11 and 12 year old primary school children, involves five visits from a garda during the school year. Already, he says, over 200,000 children have "got the message" through this programme.
For the gardai schools are "an excellent forum for the disemination of information," says Delaney. A module on drugs is to be included in the near future. School programmes should reflect social needs . . . "it can be dangerous to give information to kids when they haven't got the skills to deal with it".
ALTHOUGH it's difficult to know the extent of substance misuse, a number of initiatives has been launched by the Government. Many of them have been incorporated into school programmes. Some are in use in communities. The most recent initiative was launched by the Department of Health last month aimed at those involved in HIV/AIDS education. In the same month there were reports of second level students having been expelled after drugs were found in their possession.
"Schools can't walk away from their responsibilities in this area," says John Carr, assistant general secretary of the INTO. However, he believes that schools are increasingly becoming vehicles for solving any number of issues.
There is a need for new social and health programmes in schools but he stresses the need to integrate them into the curriculum.
Gerry King, a teacher at Davitt College in Castlebar, Co Mayo, and a member of the TUI national executive, recently conducted a straw poll on the views of colleagues in the North West about the problem of drugs in schools.
"The feeling is that it's not a problem in the schools in the country," says King. "It's part of young people's social lives all right and that can effect school life. Although it's beginning to surface now, we are still fairly immune to it, particularly in the more rural areas. The way it is in the small towns, the drugs are there but you have to go looking for them at the disco scene.
The TUI doesn't yet have a national policy on the problem. "It's only coming to the surface," he says. "It's not too late and we are taking steps to work on it." TUI members who spoke to him favour structured lesson plans which teach assertiveness skills. Teachers believe that giving students the strength to say no is the best way forward.
John Mulcahy, president of the ASTI, sees substance misuse as "a very big social problem". There is great concern among teachers who are aware that their students are into "a life style that is dangerous to their health". Teachers also understand that students can be impressionable age and open to peer pressure.
AS executive chairman of Coolmine House, Jim Comberton has been involved in helping young people recover from drug abuse since 1973. He stresses the need for parents to get involved. "Parents don't get involved, mostly through fear," he says. "When parents fail to supervise their children their peers take their place. When a kid emotionally bonds with another youngster who is using drugs it's a particularly strong himself, for him to use drugs himself."
At Coolmine he says, "we are often mobilising parents to create a climate within the community that is anti pathetic to drugs. "The reality is that society expects too much from education. Parents have a handle on kids, a lot of them don't believe that or that they have rights to exercise them.
"They think if their kids are on drugs that they must be bad parents, they feel guilty. We try to get through that and get the message through that you must get in the way.
Comberton appreciates that parents are often inhibited by understandable feelings of guilt. "We say to parents that you are never going to be on expert on drugs but you know your child's behaviour and you have a built in alarm system and respect your own alarm system."
The team at Coolmine sees itself "very much as a resource group. We have a manual for communities who want to do their own thing. The parents must state a position, take a very firm stand about where they stand. They can achieve extraordinary things if given the right tools to do it. We believe parents have that power.
A programme developed in Cork to support long term prevention of drug and alcohol misuse also targets parents, because they are seen as the true agents of change. The approach of this Family Communication and Self Esteem programme, is one of "reminding parents about the good job they are doing and supporting them in doing this better," as the course manual explains. Frank Door, of the Cork Social and Health Education Project, says the programme "helps them strengthen their authority without them becoming authoritarian."
The manual concludes that "if family communication is good from the earliest days potential problems are likely to be smaller and more easily overcome."
