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A growing number of educators, parents and law-enforcement people are coming to believe that if only more children were led to give such answers, the war might someday be won. Education in the perils of narcotics and in the techniques of resisting peer pressure to "come on, try it" is one approach that offers some real hope of reducing drug use.
The notion may draw snickers from people subjected to the lurid lectures on the horrors of narcotics that generally passed for drug education in the '60s and '70s. "It only takes one kid in an auditorium who says, 'Hey, I know someone who did that drug and it didn't happen to him,' and your message is gone," says Richard Booze, assistant director of a Chicago-area training center for teachers. Many experts also doubt the effectiveness of Nancy Reagan's "Just Say No" effort. That drive, focused on children 7 to 14, has prompted the organization of 10,000 clubs in which at least 200,000 youngsters have publicly pledged not to use drugs. Perhaps this will do some good, but often much more than a pledge is required.
Accordingly, school districts, foundations, law-enforcement authorities and parent groups are shaping more thorough programs. The National Institute on Drug Abuse figures 72% of the nation's estimated 45.3 million elementary- and secondary-school students are being offered some kind of drug education, but sometimes it may amount to only a paragraph in a health textbook. The U.S. Department of Education's funding for drug education has been so tiny that no one has kept track of it. The department, however, is now considering a $100 million program.
Authorities generally agree on the requirements for an effective program. It must start in the lower grades or kindergarten; two health educators at the state-funded Western Massachusetts Primary Prevention Center are even developing a program for preschoolers. It must be continuous, not a one-shot or one-week affair. It must go beyond drugs to teach children how to develop the self-esteem that those tempted by narcotics usually lack and how to deal with strains and tensions without turning to drugs. It must not only tell children to say no but train them to resist peer pressure. And it must be realistic: Booze, for example, candidly tells children that drugs produce a giddy high similar to riding a swing, but he goes on to detail what follows that high.
One of the more comprehensive programs is DARE, for Drug Abuse Resistance Education, begun in Los Angeles three years ago and since copied by 62 school districts around the country. Police officers meet for 45 minutes to an hour with teachers and classes in elementary and junior high schools for 17 lessons stretching through a semester. Many lessons have little to do directly with drugs; they concentrate on such ideas as ego and self-esteem. Though they might seem cloudy concepts for sixth-graders, the officers try to make them fun by using balloons and role-playing games.