DARE drug program could be dropped without proof of effectiveness

customwire.ap.org ^

[chance33_98]

DARE drug program could be dropped without proof of effectiveness

BIRMINGHAM, Ala. (AP) -- Drug abuse prevention programs such as DARE could be on their way out of Alabama classrooms if they can't prove that they are effective, drug treatment experts said.

Federal, state and local governments have poured millions of dollars over the last decade into Drug Abuse Resistance Education, or DARE, a program that puts police into elementary school classrooms to encourage students not to use drugs.

But federal and state spending on DARE - whose license tags reading "DARE to keep kids off drugs" often are seen on police and parents' vehicles - already is on the way out, said Kent Hunt, associate commissioner for substance abuse at the Alabama Department of Mental Health and Mental Retardation.

"I see a movement away from that unless DARE can modify their curriculum and get a stamp of approval as an evidence-based or science-based program, and it's not there yet," Hunt said at a Friday meeting organized by the University of Alabama at Birmingham.

Numerous Alabama school systems still use DARE, even though the federal government has advised systems to drop the program.

The No Child Left Behind Act requires states to spend money only on programs that can prove their effectiveness. DARE is revising its curriculum but still has not received federal approval, said Kris Vilamaa, program manager for law enforcement and traffic safety at the Alabama Department of Economic and Community Affairs.

Judge Karen Freeman Wilson, executive director of the National Association of Drug Court Professionals, attended the meeting and suggested courts emphasizing rehabilitation for drug offenders, rather than prison time, could help more people. There are 11 such drug courts in Alabama.

"The utopia is for us to infuse the drug court philosophy and the way of doing business into the criminal justice system," Freeman Wilson said.

Family court judges from Huntsville and Birmingham said the state has too few alternatives to prison. They said they are forced to send children to faraway programs or lock them in juvenile jails because there are not enough local treatment options.

"We're forcing our state juvenile justice system to deal with a problem they shouldn't have to deal with," said Randy Johnson, deputy court administrator for Jefferson County Family Court.

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[Monty22]

Frankly I think these programs mostly backfire and make kids more curious to do the stuff. Kids don't give a crap mostly about consequences.

[dirtboy]

Since when has effectiveness become a criteria for judging a government program? The typical response to the failure of a program is to do lots more of it in the hopes that it will somehow work despite prior experiences.

[headsonpikes]

Human nature 38 - Social Engineering 0.

Ha ha!

[RightField]

Reason #34536 to homeschool!

[steve-b]

Aren't these the bozos who tried to sue somebody for publishing a "I Turned In My Parents And All I Got Was This Lousy T-Shirt" parody?

If they don't even have a competent staff (and any competent staff could have told them that this is a slam-dunk case of protected free speech, or found a lawyer who would have told them so, within an hour), how can they possibly be effective at anything?

[sharktrager]

Rolling Stone did a great piece on DARE years ago. The folks that run it try to hide the actual results, and threaten and harass those who question it's effectiveness.

This could be interesting.

[robertpaulsen]

"The No Child Left Behind Act requires states to spend money only on programs that can prove their effectiveness."

Does this mean the end of the Head Start program? Yeah, right.

[bassmaner]

WOD bump

[BamaMom]

Dare costs $750 million bucks a year, is in 70% of the nations' schools and studies show that it only positively affects only 10% of the children it is geared to.
Seems to me that the War On Drugs.. is another example of government making sure the employees have a job and pay raises.
What they don't tell the children who report their parents for pot is how mistreated they will be by the government protective agencies while in "protective custody" of the state.
The children get more than a T Shirt.. they get a horror ride of terror and harm while the system gets more money for having them "in Care".
The Government has found yet another way to use our children to keep money flowing in their pockets. They want to raise the children to have only the "right" opinions and to undermine the rights of family.
Wake up Americans..