8/9/2019 Report from the Safe & Drug Free Schools conference 1997

http://slidepdf.com/reader/full/report-from-the-safe-drug-free-schools-conference-1997 1/6

8/9/2019 Report from the Safe & Drug Free Schools conference 1997

http://slidepdf.com/reader/full/report-from-the-safe-drug-free-schools-conference-1997 2/6

I n June, over 500 educators and drug and violenceprevention experts gathered in the nation’s capital

to discuss weeding a very large garden.

This garden is the garden of prevention program-ming—a garden that has produced a bumper crop of initiatives, but now needs some careful tending. At theSafe and Drug-Free Schools Program conference thispast summer, attendees were warned of the overcrowd-ing of this garden and were given suggestions on howto tend its needs.

Prevention programming in the schools—as well asin communities—faces many challenges today. Criticalamong these challenges is the issue of funding andthe issue of success, which go hand in hand. Butbefore facing these challenges, the first question is:Why drug and violence prevention programming in the

nation’s schools?Vice President of the United States Al Gore, during

the opening session of the conference, explained it sim-ply: “The future of our schools equals the future of ourcountry.” To secure this future, the President and VicePresident declared education to be their number onepriority during this administration. This priority wasset in parameters such as these: every 8-year-old mustbe able to read; every 12-year-old must have access tothe Information Superhighway; every 18-year-old must

be able to go to college if he or she so chooses;and every adult must be able to continue learning fora lifetime.

If students are to achieve any educational goals, theschools where this learning takes place need to be envi-ronments free of obstacles to the learning process. If students and teachers fear for their physical safetywithin the schools, this learning will not occur.Likewise, if drugs are present and if they becomeentangled in the students’ lives, this learning will notoccur. As Gore pointed out, “Because schools are safer,they are more conducive to both teaching and learn-ing.” But he warned the fight for the Safe and Drug-Free Schools Program is not over.

The Department of Education’s Safe and Drug-FreeSchools Program, therefore, hosted a conference thissummer to discuss prevention programming for adoles-cents and how to turn current research into effectiveaction. It is the current research that provides the foun-dation for the job of weeding the garden. General BarryMcCaffrey, Director of the Office of National DrugControl Policy (ONDCP), explained, “There is noquestion in my mind that we’ve got to kill some of the100 flowers that have bloomed and evaluate drug pre-vention programs on the basis of scientific findings.”

“We can’t have random activities. We’ve got to havea purpose. We’ve got to have a framework—some con-

ceptual ladder—to build our drug prevention pro-grams,” McCaffrey added.

W eeding the gardenTo take on the task of weeding this rather large gar-

den of prevention programming, one needs the propergardening tools, or in this case, a set of guidelines.Luckily, within the Safe and Drug-Free Schools andCommunities Act, these guidelines have been spelledout. They are the four principles of effectiveness—thefour steps that will help ensure success when choosing

a prevention program. These principles insist that achosen program:

1. Is based on a thorough assessment of objective dataabout the drug and violence problems in the com-munities served;

2. Can meet measurable goals and objectives;

3. Is based on research and evaluation; and

4. Is evaluated periodically.

8ThE ChALLEN

gE v7, n3

CC ONFERENCEONFERENCE R R EPORTEPORT

T urningurningR esearchesearchintointo A ctionction A REPORT FROM THE

S AFE AND DRUG -FREE

SCHOOLS CONFERENCE

By Jill Lewis-Kelly, American Council for Drug Education

8/9/2019 Report from the Safe & Drug Free Schools conference 1997

http://slidepdf.com/reader/full/report-from-the-safe-drug-free-schools-conference-1997 3/6ThE ChALLEN

gE v7, n3

9

Throughout the conference thesesteps were emphasized by plenarysession speakers, and during theworkshop sessions, individual pro-

grams told of how these steps ledto effectiveness.

1 N eeds A ssessment

Before choosing from the manyprevention programs that grow inthe field, a school or communitymust understand what the spe-cific problems of its own con-

stituency are. Is the problemconnected to drugs, to violence,or to both? How does one ascer-tain this information?

Understanding the nationalproblem first will help to focuson an individual local problem.Dr. Lloyd Johnston, principalinvestigator of The Monitoring the Future study, expertlydescribed the national problemof adolescent drug use to theconference attendees early on inthe three-day event. He report-ed current statistics from hisstudy which show an increasein marijuana, tobacco, andheroin use among the nation’syoung people.

In order to understand theseincreases, Johnson discussedthe relationship of drug use to theamount of risk that adolescentsassociate with drug use and towhether or not they disapprove of drug use. While these statistics por-tray disturbing trends across thecountry, to choose the right preven-tion program, educators must try tounderstand these trends withintheir own communities.

Dr. David Hawkins of the SeattleSocial Development Project,

explained how to base assessmentson risk and protection factors.These factors have been proven inlongitudinal studies to greatly

influence adolescent behavior. Thisapproach to assessments basicallysays, “If we want to prevent a prob-lem before it happens, we need toknow what factors increase risk forthat problem and then reduce thoserisk factors.” Conversely, one mustknow what factors prevent or pro-tect against the development of theproblem and increase those protec-tive factors.

Hawkins, therefore, suggestsassessing a community’s uniqueprofile of risk and protection. This

allows the school and the commu-nity to make decisions about whereit should focus its efforts and con-centrate its resources.

Present at the conference wererepresentatives from a number of successful programs. Assessmentof community needs was often thekey to their success. Joseph Carter,from the Boston Police Depart-

ment, described how his organiza-tion responded to widespread fearcaused by an alarming number of youthful homicides that occurred

in Boston during the late 1980s andearly 1990s. By studying data onthe victims, the Department wasable to develop a victim profile.But it took a high level of collabo-ration before police were fully ableto understand what they were upagainst. Only by working with theProbation Department and a net-work of community leaders was itpossible to define the problem of

youthful violence in Boston.

In Denver, collaboration wasalso key to understanding theproblem. There, the AsianPacific Center for HumanDevelopment conducted a vari-ety of focus groups that includ-ed students, parents, school rep-resentatives, and evaluatorsbefore creating an after-schoolprogram for at-risk youths.

But not all successful pro-grams have started with a col-laborative assessment phase.Azim Khamisa told the confer-ence spoke about starting theTariq Khamisa Foundation,dedicated to creating safer com-munities by curbing youthfulviolence and promoting person-al responsibility, after his son,Tariq was killed two years ago.

Tariq’s assailant was 14 years old.Khamisa brings the foundation’sprogram of Violence ImpactForums into local schools to helppromote healing and to reduce thetraumatic effects of violence.

For most programs representedat the conference, the critical firststep in bringing drug and violenceprevention into the schools hasbeen understanding the local situa-tion. As D.J. Ida, from the Asian

8/9/2019 Report from the Safe & Drug Free Schools conference 1997

http://slidepdf.com/reader/full/report-from-the-safe-drug-free-schools-conference-1997 4/6

10ThE ChALLEN

gE v7, n3

CC ONFERENCEONFERENCE R R EPORTEPORT

Pacific Center for HumanDevelopment in Denver, said abouther focus groups, it’s where onecan learn what others see as theproblems and what are the causesof those problems.

2M easurableGoals &Objectives

Determining community needsprovides the basis for selecting pre-vention programs. Schools mustensure that the programs theychoose to implement are designedto respond to the needs they haveidentified, and they should consid-er only programs that have measur-able goals and objectives.

The Community That Cares pro-gram, developed by Dr. Hawkins,provides a process making it possi-ble to select prevention programsby first defining program goals.Once risk and protective factorshave been identified, a set of outcome-based planning tools areused to identify desired medium-and long-term outcomes. These, in

turn, establish the goals that driveselection of appropriate programs.

Most participants at the confer-ence described their programs interms of goals and objectives.Phyllis Ellickson of RandCorporation, developer of ProjectALERT, spoke broadly aboutincreasing student motivation toresist drugs and developing skills

of resistance. She offered as oneobjective, helping young peopleacquire reasons not to use drugsby, for example, challenging cer-tain normative beliefs about drugsand encouraging adolescents tobelieve they are capable of resist-ing drugs. For the goal of develop-ing resistance skills, ProjectALERT helps kids identify pres-sures that might encourage them touse drugs and learn ways to counterthese pressures.

Project STAR also emphasizesthe development of drug resistanceskills as a program goal, but makesa point to include goals and objec-tives for the community as well.“It’s important when developing orchoosing an effective program thatit includes community-level objec-tives and activities that are time-

lined and easy-to-use with existingresources,” Mary Ann Pentz,developer of Project STAR, report-ed. One of this program’s goals is

to encourage non-drug use andreinforce non-drug social normsand expectations in the community.

In Boston, where the overridinggoal was to reduce youth homi-cides, the police commissionerdeveloped 16 community teamsinvolving more than 400 people.These teams included clergy, busi-ness leaders, labor officials, andelected officials, as well as police.The teams were charged withdeveloping a strategic plan tochange police orientation and givethe department a neighborhoodfocus. It was up to the teams to setout the goals and objectives to real-ize the desired outcome.

3 R esearch-basedP rograms

“Turning Research into Action”was the theme of this summer’sconference and research-based pro-grams were in the limelight.

“The history of prevention in thearea of substance abuse and delin-quency does not have a strongrecord,” Dr. Hawkins told the gath-ering. General McCaffrey of ONDCP stressed the need tochange previous ways of thinkingabout prevention. “One of our firstchallenges today is to try to replaceideology and polemics withscience and well-thought-outmedical and social-based conclu-sions,” he said.

Dr. Gilbert Botvin, developer of Life Skills Training, agreed. “Weknow the causes of drug abuse andhow to prevent it, and thereforethere’s no excuse for developing

8/9/2019 Report from the Safe & Drug Free Schools conference 1997

http://slidepdf.com/reader/full/report-from-the-safe-drug-free-schools-conference-1997 5/6ThE ChALLEN

gE v7, n3

11

prevention programs that are basedlargely on ideology and intuition.It’s time to move to approachesbased on sound science.”

Discussing research on risk andprotective factors, Dr. Hawkinsexplained that a lot has beenlearned in the last 20 years aboutwhat factors contribute to makingyoung people both more and lessvulnerable to substance abuse andviolence. Factors within schools(i.e., failure to ensure academicsuccess of all children), withinfamilies (i.e., failure to set clearexpectations for children), and forindividuals and peer groups (i.e.,initiating undesirable behavior atearly ages) all contribute to risk.

Protective factors include pro-moting healthy beliefs and clearstandards of behavior for youngpeople and making it possible foryoung people to develop bondswith adults or groups in communi-ties and schools. Providing oppor-tunities for active involvement,teaching the skills that are neededto be successful, and having a con-sistent system of recognition arethe three conditions that must bepresent if a young person is todevelop a healthy bond with anadult or a group. This will increasethe protection that guards theyoung person from violence andsubstance abuse.

Many programs at the confer-ence have developed strategies tolimit risk factors and enhance pro-tective factors. These included:The Seattle Social DevelopmentProject, Communities that Care,FAST, Life Skills Training, ProjectSTAR, Strengthening Families,Project Family, ReconnectingYouth, and Project ALERT.

Much research in recent yearshas focused on the fundamentals of

effective prevention programming,and much discussion during thethree days of the conference dealtwith these findings.

Mathea Falco, President of DrugStrategies, Incorporated developeda list of key components for effec-tive programs after she reviewedthe 47 programs described in herbook, Making the Grade: A Guideto School Drug Prevention

Programs . But she has plenty of company. A number of conferenceparticipants presented their ownlists of fundamental elementsfor effective prevention programs.And Falco noted, “More and morelists are springing up all over.It’s good (to have so many),because this may lead us to operat-ing standards.”

Certain fundamentals appear onthe vast majority of these lists,indicating significant consensusabout what good preventionprograms should be doing.They should:n

Target known risk and protectivefactors;n Teach drug resistance skills, per-

sonal skills, and social skills;n Emphasize interactive teaching

methods;n Provide age appropriate infor-

mation; andn Use a comprehensive, multi-

component approach.

“The research is finally here!”conference presenters exclaimed.After 20 years, prevention expertsnow know what works and whatdoesn’t work; they know whatcauses the problems and whatsolutions are available. And educa-tors now have the information andtools available to use this research

to implement good preventionprograms in their schools.

4 EvaluateP rogramsWith needs assessed, programs

based on sound research and mea-surable goals determined, it’s timeto discover whether or not every-thing is working. A program mustbe evaluated periodically in orderto measure its success.

D.J. Ida recommends includingan evaluation team right at thebeginning of program design orduring a needs assessment. Shefound that having evaluators thereat the start avoided a “we versusthey” situation between the pro-gram designer and the evaluators,and before long they were all ask-ing the same questions. Whether ornot evaluation is involved in theprocess from the beginning, it mustbe conducted in a periodic manneronce the program is implementedin order to understand if the pro-gram is meeting its desired goalsand objectives.

Pentz of Project STAR describedfour ways to evaluate a program.A program can be evaluatedby measuring:

1. Change in one particular group(a very weak method of evalua-tion, according to Pentz);

2. Cross-sectional differences be-tween two groups;

3. Net group difference or reduc-tion; or

4. Net program efficiency.

All programs at the conferencedescribed their evaluation proce-dures, whether there was a controlgroup or not, and how the data was

8/9/2019 Report from the Safe & Drug Free Schools conference 1997

http://slidepdf.com/reader/full/report-from-the-safe-drug-free-schools-conference-1997 6/6

12ThE ChALLEN

gE v7, n3

CC ONFERENCEONFERENCE R R EPORTEPORT

collected. Some programs ex-plained that early evaluation of theprogram helped them define areaswhere the program was weak. This

allowed them to remedy the weak-ness and make the overall programmore effective.

W hat does allof this mean ?

Dr. Botvin hailed the dawn of anew day in prevention; MatheaFalco claimed she was delightedthat prevention is

finally having its dayin Washington; buteveryone from VicePresident Al Gore tothe Secretary of Education, RichardRiley, agreed that thework of creating safeand drug-free schoolsis not over.

Research hastaught those in theprevention field afew things. The mostimportant thing learn-ed is that violenceand drug use are pre-ventable behaviors.Dr. Prothow-Stithdiscussed violence asa preventable behav-ior and pointedspecifically to pro-grams like the Boston

Strategy, for reducingyouth crime, andResolving ConflictCreatively as pro-grams that haverecords of provensuccess. As for sub-stance use and abuse,Dr. Alan Leshner,Director of the

National Institute on Drug Abuse,said, “We have ideologies galoreabout drug abuse and addiction, butwe also have scientific data. And

that data tells us that drug use is apreventable behavior and drugaddiction is a treatable disease.”

There is plenty of evidence thatprograms developed and targetedto prevent these behaviors work.Many presenters at the conferencedetailed this evidence. But all thishas to go one step further. Theentire country, not just politicalleaders and educators, needs

to support prevention, and thatwon’t happen until the countrycan see that it works. “Behaviorchange is the bottom line. Without

it you can’t really prove success,”Falco said.

Evaluation, research, and soundscience are the three tools thatneed to occupy everyone’s garden-ing shed. With these tools inhand, weeding the prevention gar-den will be easier than almostanyone thought.

The American Medical Association reportson adolescent health and the importanceof protective factors

Adolescents who are emotionally connectedto their families and schools are generallyhealthier than those who are not, according toan article in the September 10 issue of TheJournal of the American Medical Association(JAMA).

This is the AMA’s first report as a result of

the National Longitudinal Study onAdolescent Health. AMA researchers foundthat when adolescents feel connected to theirparents and their school, they are less likelythan other adolescents to:n Suffer from emotional distress.n Have suicidal thoughts and behaviors.n Use violence.n Smoke cigarettes, drink alcohol or smoke

marijuana.They also have their first sexual experience

later than adolescents who are not connected totheir parents and schools, but researchers

found no protective effect against pregnancy.The researchers write: “... The role of par-ents and family in shaping the health of ado-lescents is evident.” They found that perceivedhigh expectations by parents regarding schoolachievement was protective against some riskybehaviors, while the physical presence of aparent in the home reduced the risk of sub-stance abuse. However, physical presencewas less significant in the overall health of adolescents than was parental connectedness,

such as feelings of warmth, love, and caringfrom parents.”

As with previous studies, the researchersfound high rates of risky behaviors amongadolescents:n Suicide—10.2% of girls and 7.5% of boys

reported having considered suicide without

actually attempting it over the past year,while 5.1% of girls and 2.1% of boys report-ed suicide attempts.

n Cigarettes—25.7% of adolescents reportedbeing current smokers, with 10.0% of malesand 9.2% of females smoking six or morecigarettes per day.

n Alcohol—17.9% of students reported drink -ing alcohol more than monthly, with 9.9%drinking at least one day per week.

n Marijuana—25.2% reported ever havingsmoked marijuana, with 12.7% reportingthat they had smoked at least once duringthe previous month.

n Sexual behaviors—Approximately 17% of 7th and 8th graders and nearly half of 9ththrough 12 graders indicated that they hadever had sexual intercourse.

n Pregnancy—Among sexually experiencedfemales aged 15 years and older, 19.8%reported having ever been pregnant.

Source: The Journal of the American Medical Association Abstracts.