before we get started here's what she frick from the peter township police department had to sa perspective in any community things that they do not have a plan to drag it into didn't have their heads in the sand because every community has a problem with drugs determining how serious that problem is becomes a real you know it's recently been in the news that schools in our area cities up a parking mount lebanon have discovered that many of their students have drug and alcohol problems so katie do you think that drugs and alcohol are a big problem in peter's township i do i don't think that it's as by many people identified as a problem but i definitely think there is a problem with drugs and alcohol in our school and in other schools do you think drugs are drugs and alcohol are accessible to p c s just i believe i definitely prescription pills that people talk about and these assist at our big city big cities in my inner city schools but it's definitely the same here as it is anywhere else and there's really no difference do you think it's us same frequency as other places or do you think that that's mostly quote unquote softer drugs that are used here was definitely the majority of drugs i would say in my opinion would definitely be not as hardcore the softer   sometimes programs that we have at the school they tell us that in places like peter's township it's actually easier for kids to get the harder drugs the more expensive just because you know  i don't know how much it actually is but you hear stories like you hear everything you hear marijuana you hear alcohol you hear even like cocaine like as far as like frequency and like  and of course there are still going to be some who use prescription drugs or hard drugs like cocaine but i do see the more frequent use is primarily on alcohol do you think that we have a problem  but i think a lot of the kids know that you shouldn't do that like i even though they may be using drugs and alcohol that you shouldn't drive but when i do that is another story have you seen the facts and of course you know people  and interpersonal relationships maybe with their peers their friends that are using drugs sometimes they trade tension between and there's always trouble involved when the police come into it and many times as happened i mean you may not hear about in the news or the way they interact with their peers like goes on till their motivation goes on so that they don't perform as well in school or actually curricular activities or athletics and it's it's kind of disappointing so when do you think this begins when do we start when when do kids in our age group start using drugs or alcohol i think it starts the middle school level well there's not as many drugs i think it's more on the alcohol level because kids can get that easier when they're in middle school either by taking it from their parents or from their older siblings i think the drugs start more in the high school and while it's still my might be a slight problem in the middle school i'd say there's not going to be an arc i see too many middle school kids going out and buying drugs i don't have a if you use alcohol and that kind of leads them into drugs in the high school or different types of activities like i think in middle school you know the thing that kids were more experimental most was the you know like the cigarettes and stuff like that and i think that's probably where it all started because you know just with cigarettes and then you spell it out from that and i also want to talk to you katie about you came from st louis as which is a private school was it were you shocked when you came to the high school actually yeah families are kind of like a little bubble like you don't really know like anything that happened at a time job i mean you had a few kids who interacted with like middle schoolers we're like but as far as kind of a high school like the transition it was really different i had no idea but i mean you make choices and you can choose to belong to certain crowds and it's kind of different it's a good point a lot of it is your own personal choice you know we have computers tons of students about what drugs they've i've seen people doing coke i saw some kids snorting in the bathroom one time i've seen cocaine i've seen marijuana heroin ecstasy pretty much anything that is around here we'll be back with more of the big picture after this short break discussed whether or not teens in our community have a drug and alcohol problem and i think we've all pretty much come to the conclusion that it's an issue in our area i agree but the question that still remains is where does all this begin and so we asked she freaked why he believes that teens use drugs and here's what he had to say that's a very good course the answer also because there's so many reasons i think if you ask any psychiatry psychologist the do with this issue lauren where do you think that this whole desire for drug use comes from i think it probably starts in the early middle school age group because kids are so influenced by what other older kids are doing around them and i think that just basically saying that older siblings and thinking that is the cool thing to do that's basically where it starts so a lot of is like examples yeah role models i think that's a really big consideration as high school students have take to heart because for us an example for the middle school kids and they think that taking drugs and using alcohol is a good thing and is what we're supposed to be doing and they're going to cause and they repeat it it's going to be a cycle i think that we need to stop with the high school students that example do you think that peer pressure is also definitely i think that maybe it's not as big of a factor as everyone thinks that they're like shoving these alcohol on their faces and like i'm forcing them to do things but i just think that being there middle school age i mean i have a brother that's in the school and we've all been there i mean your peers have so much but power over what you do i think that if they don't even if they don't think it's peer pressure that it's actually i mean it is you know i do you on that and i think that when you're in middle school i think that your  be kind of hit home to the kids in the school that you can make your own decisions and beer and person without using drugs and alcohol just because maybe the coolest can schools doing it or whoever you want to hang out with is doing it it's not something that excludes you from being part of the group and i think it's up to the high school kids and the older kids to do that because in middle school everyone thinks that their parents are wrong everything and i think they're more prone to listen to older kids that have been there and that are i mean still in school do you think th parents know about what's going on i think some parents probably do and they're either into nille or they just condone it but i think a lot of i think kids like they really do know how to get around their parents backs and they  what so what can parents do what can people do to stop this i think to know where their kids are spend more time talking to their kids about what they've been doing here they've been hanging out with i mean just talk to your kids  good example and it's also like the role the parent to say you know to drink responsibly or do things like that that show their kid how this is acceptable behavior in the back and i think it also helps encourage other activities like people are always saying this not a lot of things to do around here so what do they do they sit around and they drink or they smoke up or whatever so get involved in other things i think tell your schedule we're really lucky lucky that we have you know programs at our  can we talk a little bit about how the media sometimes portrays drug and alcohol abuse does it affect kids positively negatively well the media has always been kind of seen is one of the major factors influencing kids and i think that's why for the fact that it's been made out to be by many like certainly news magazine shows or parents sometimes blame it on the media i think that that's kind of an easy way out an easy thing to blame it on i think that that is one of the least well these pervasive things that influence kids to take drugs or drink and it's more of an example like we said before and what they see around them not what they see on v i think it's i think it's a major i think the media can be a major factor in influencing people but i think that you know good role models and good good parents can can definitely i think that definitely it's the role models like in your life into you i mean you grow up running whatever environment you're in is going to form you into the type of person you're going to be but the media helps to kind of if you're always seeing teenagers drinking and doing drugs and things like that then it's just always in your head and you're always seeing can't get away from it so i think that's i mean that's the rule  applies there's also a lot of you know positive media out there like public service announcements you know those troops commercials that we always see on t v those are really positive students so i think more and more the media's come around to showing the negative effects of drug and alcohol use something that's a good thing to expand on the cheese commercials you were talking about i mean it's another thing it's ignored a lot by people is smoking and some people don't see it as dangerous or more dangerous than drinking or taking drugs and it definitely is and while it doesn't have the most direct effect on what happens later in life it's been shown that obviously cause cancer and other problems with your lungs i think that's ignored sometimes when people focus too much on drugs and alcohol smoking is definitely a big problem to the point let's talk a little bit about the programs that we have at our school like  we take the dare program when i guess it's in middle school or elementary you guys find this to be effective i think that it kind of started you out on the right foot when you're little i think it started like second grade it started you out knowing that smoking is bad for you and alcohol is bad for you and all these things and i think that it just got the message starting in your head and it continues throughout high school so that you constantly have that message that these things are bad for your health they can get you in a lot of trouble and the jet program has come under criticism because some people say it doesn't work and there's been the studies that people have done but i overall i'd say that their program is pretty effective throughout on their school and it tends to trail off in high school i think that's a problem with it but definitely if it helps five kids out of all the people that age is definitely still a positive influence and i think it's important that that education be there because i think that you know with more education the less the less likely you are to to get involved and things frankly and it's but it's also important to know that it's not just going to take you know going to a couple classes at school it takes more than that from your parents your friends yeah they're outside we have to stop and go to commercial but when we come back molly and i will have telephone numbers that you can contact if you a teenager or a friend of yours has a drug or alcohol part problem so you may want to get a pencil and paper handy will be back with more the big picture after th perspective one of the biggest things in helping maybe not solve i don't know there is a definite solution i think a lot of it comes back to the family and teaching kids values that the family supports and those values would include anti drug or anti alcohol issues i think it requires the support of the family i think it's an issue that has to be talked about within the family and i think young people have to realize that although they think their peer group is their support element it really should be their family that's the support element and they need to be there for that individual for them to survive and get through that the world we live there are a lot of programs that are working both locally and nationally to help prevent are to how parents and teachers combat drugs and alcohol abuse locally we have several organizations and services available for p t a just students such a sad but just students against drugs star student assistant referral team and drug and alcohol prevention and aftercare counselors are available to p t a just in some programs offered in peter's township include alcoholics anonymous which is open twenty four hours the number for the service is four one two four seven one seventy four seventy two the care centers number is seven two four two two eight twenty two the neighborhood drug awareness corps number is seven two four two two nine eighty three twenty one and the phone number for gateway vision which is another counseling service is seven two four two two eight zero eight one  recently david tells internationally famous author and motivational speaker visited peters township high school and spoke to the students to inspire them to take responsibility for their actions and take control of their lives david has penned three bestsellers including a child called it a lost boy and a man named dave here's what he had to say about drug use if you have an issue if you have a promise and resolve and you put something in the equation now you have multiple problems at the end of the day you can access at the end of the day you can drug around you can sleep around you can do all these things but who are you really hurting you look at a problem for what it was you start to deal with it is your body's phone thousand the physical and psychological change none of us have all the answers at least we talk about things like we talked about nine eleven after the tragedy of september eleventh we talk about things that put us on the road to recovery on a national level programs include focus adolescent services the number for that is one eight seven seven focus f o c us a s another program is offered through the national council on alcoholism and drug dependence the number for that is one eight hundred and ca ca the american council on alcoholism offers advice there it's a nationwide house on the number for that is one eight hundred five to seven five three four four you know on today's show we heard some speculation as to why some teens in our community may use drugs it because of my parents he has it interferes with my sports and little ruin my reputation i choose not to judge now because of personal decisions i don't because it inhibits my future so much fun