School Board Approves

Substance Abuse Survey

By Larissa Lytwyn

The Board of Education this week unanimously approved a $2,100 donation from the state Department of Mental Health and Addiction Services (DMHAS) for Newtown schools to administer a substance abuse survey to approximately 750 students in grades 7 through 12 on April 13.

The survey will be structurally similar to the 2002 assessment administered to Newtown through the governor’s Prevention Initiative in conjunction with the University of Connecticut Health Center.

“The DMHAS survey is just one piece of our ongoing needs assessment in Newtown,” explained district Health Director Judy Blanchard, chair of the town’s Prevention Council, at the school board’s March 15 meeting. “We are one of just a few towns throughout the state to be receiving this grant.”

Approximately 125 students will be randomly selected across each of the six grade levels. Participants, Ms Blanchard assured, would remain anonymous.

The schools, she continued, would notify parents of students who could be potentially surveyed. Parents could then have the option of exempting their children from participating.

Ms Blanchard said that one of the criteria for acquiring the DMHAS grant was already having collected data on substance use and abuse among students through the 2002 survey.

“This DMHAS survey could potentially be administered annually, or every other year, as one of our many tools in identifying Newtown’s needs in fighting and preventing substance abuse,” she said.

Data would begin being collected this fall, with a report on survey findings presented to the Board of Education next spring.

2002 Survey Results

The 2002 survey revealed that while relatively low substance abuse levels exist in grades 7 to 9, the numbers rise significantly among older students. Recent underage drinking reported by Newtown’s tenth through twelfth graders, for example, was “at or above the national average,” stated the survey summary.

While, nationally, 48.6 percent of seniors reported drinking in the past month, 68.6 percent of Newtown seniors said they were recent drinkers.

The survey also revealed major discrepancies between younger and older students in their attitude toward substance abuse.

While 15.7 percent of seventh and eighth graders felt it was “wrong” for someone their age to drink alcoholic beverages, 57.8 percent of ninth and tenth graders said it “not at all” wrong or “a little bit wrong.” Further, 32.6 percent of eleventh and twelfth graders saw little or no harm in getting drunk occasionally, the survey found.

Like elsewhere in Connecticut, marijuana is the most commonly used illicit drug among adolescents in Newtown; 38.7 percent of eleventh and twelfth graders, according to the survey, admitted to using marijuana in the previous month.

Frequent marijuana usage is linked to increased substance dependence, accidental injury, emergency room admissions, poor school performance, legal problems, and increased school dropout rates, the survey reported.

 Consequences

This past summer, the school board approved a revised substance abuse policy that makes students eligible for expulsion on their second substance-related offense.

On their first offense, however, students automatically undergo intensive, mandated counseling with the aim of eradicating any potential development of a substance abuse problem.

Under the former substance abuse policy, students were eligible for expulsion for one calendar year at their third offense.

The Prevention Council has also been active in gathering community resources available for Newtown residents seeking assistance with substance abuse. Newtown Youth Services and Newtown Parent Connection, an organization aimed at the eradication of substance use and abuse, also hold a weekly Hope and Support meeting at 6:30 pm on Mondays. For more information, contact Newtown Youth Services at 270-4335. Additional resources are listed below.

Resources

Center for Child and Adolescent Treatment Services, Danbury, 830-6082.

Family Counseling Center, Mt Pleasant Road, Newtown, 426-8103.

Newtown Parent Connection, wwww.newtownparentconnection.org, 426-9280 or 426-6424.

Connecticut Clearinghouse, which offers links to a variety of mental health services, www.ctclearinghouse.org.

Liberation, Meridian & Guenster (LMG), a comprehensive substance abuse resource, www.lmgprograms.org.