They describe how D.A.R.E. and other anti-drug programs fail to reach the teenagers most at risk of drug abuse. Joel Brown of Berkeley-based Educational Research Consultants was hired by the state Department of Education to conduct one of the most extensive qualitative studies of drug education programs to date. He found that D.A.R.E. and other programs may actually be hurting our kids. If kids are taught that marijuana is as bad as heroin, and then try pot and experience few consequences, they are often more likely to experiment with the dangerously addictive hard drug. There are other problems.
Most teens oppose authoritarian measures used to punish peers caught with alcohol or drugs.
The teenagers Brown interviewed questioned whether suspension from school is really the best way to deal with kids caught experimenting with drugs. Or why the Democrats, who consider education policy their domain, haven't created a national commission to find something better. The core of the problem is that D.A.R.E. boosters refuse to recognize that teenagers experiment with drugs. Government surveys show, however, that half of high school students try an illegal drug before graduation. We can find funds for pilot programs that seek to reduce the harms associated with drugs, including addiction.