Opinions: School Violence and Drug Prevention Solutions

I'm going on an interview in this field and I would love to hear your theories/issues/problems that would help this problem in schools...

I wish I did. Unfortunately, it seems like single parenthood is considered more normal than it used to be, and many single parents are having to struggle just to financially support their children, leaving them with less time to emotionally and mentally support and prepare their children (this goes for 2-parent households as well, but single parents have a greater burden to bear, for which I give them a lot of credit). I think many parents have inadvertently failed to teach their kids some basic human decency - for others as well as for themselves, either because they are too busy or because they were never taught themselves. I think as a society, parents are being forced to push their kids into doing more and keeping up with others and the pressure aspect of it may be leading kids to seek some form of rebellion or outlet for their feelings. Everyone is so busy and running from one place to another. Living life in the fast lane has become the norm, rather than the exception, and I think that it has led to a lack of time for people to actually deal with one another. There's either something with more immediate gratification to do or we're just too d@mn tired to deal with things. I know I'm guilty of it, and don't know whether I'll be able to reign that in when I have kids, but there are so many distractions in both parents and kids' lives (technology provides a great deal of those distractions, unfortunately) that the need for human contact and relations seems to have lessened, while the value of human contact seems to have increased. And I think all of this has affected children more than people have time to realize.

I think prevention needs to start with parents realizing this and slowing down and allowing their kids to slow down a bit.

Wow, sorry if I rambled there. I guess I had more to say on this than I thought! I hope I haven't offended anyone.

I don't really have much to say about it *yet* but I just started reading a book that you might find interesting. It's called Maximum Security The Culture of Violence in Inner-City Schools by John Devine. If you can get your hands on it, it might give you a different insight on how to deal with the problem of school violence. Here's a little from the back cover 'John Devine argues that the security system, with its uniformed officers and invasive high-tech surveillance, has assumed presumptive authority over students' bodies and behavior, negating the traditional roles of teachers as guardians and agents of moral instruction. The teacher is reduced to an information bureaucrat, a purveyor of technical knowledge, while the student's physical well-being and ethical actions are left to the suspect scrutiny of electronic devices and security specialists with no pedagogical mission, training or interest. The result is not a security system at all, but an insidious institutional disengagement from the caring supervision of the student body.'
I only started reading it today, I'll let you know if there's anything really interesting.

thanks for the ideas...I have a few books on youth at risk from my MA...but it never hurts to mention a book like the one you are reading...


I would love to hear more ideas...so bumping for the morning crowd...

Hi Yabbo:

I'll try to be short, but I think one of the ways to make parents more involved is to require them to be more involved, either through work or some other means. I actually think that because in the US people often put their job in front of everything else, the employer has a lot of leverage on the employed parents.

Some of the things could be a)requiring that parents attend at least one parent night as school
b)donate x hours per year to a tutoring/after school program c)have employers organize teaching manners/anti-violence programs and requiring parents to bring kids to them.

In the end, I think employers need to actively allow a small % of paid time off for school things, b/c in the end, the kids are the future employees, whom you want to be smart and non-violent, etc.

But I doubt this will fly in the US with all its freedoms (which are often taken advantage of in the wrong way)

Does CA have the Dare program, my niece is a part of that in her elementary school.

She did mention to me that this was the first year they let the 4th graders be a part, usually it was only 5th graders.

I think that one important thing is that all kids, regardless of age should be introduced to some sort of violence and drug prevention, since people aer starting with drugs younger and younger.

Also violence can occur at any age.

Erica - good luck with the interview!!!

Sometimes even with parents being very involved is not a guarantee that the child will not use drugs or be involved in some type of violence. A kid I grew up, good kid, was a straight A student, mom was PTA president, involved in the community, on numerous committees and very involved in her kids lives yet this boy found himself mixed with the wrong crowd. He started doing drugs at 14. Started with a little pot, then went to heavier stuff. He found himself in rehab and kicked out of rehab for sneaking in drugs. He went through detox and back into a different rehab.

Even though his parents knew where he was, involved in his life he still managed to get into drugs.

I think parents being involved is a step to preventing it but its not always a guarantee.

Though I think in speaking for myself growing up, everyone knew my mom and me. I tried smoking and a friend of my mom's caught me and told my mother where I was and what I was doing. No matter where I went I ran into someone who knew my mom. So i couldnt do anything basically out of fear of who would see me and tell my mom.

thanks for your thoughts everyone...I'm taking it all in...


Melissa...regarding the guy you grew up with, what do you think in his life could have prevented the road he took? sports? clubs? a teacher noticing?

I guess since youre just asking for opinions I'll share mine.

I agree Parenting. I don't think, however, there's a magic word or a certain manual to make a parent effective. It depends a lot on the relationship.

My father and I are close. I trust him with everything and he trusts me. I broke that trust only once and the utter devestation on his face nearly killed me. We, Dad & I, are honest and open about everything.

When I started to smoke pot after a really bad break up, I told him. He said he 'understood' he didn't judge me. That helped. He just made it make sense. Do you want a job? Do you want to go to jail for something so silly? Sounds ironic, but I needed that sort of sense. He knew I wouldnt stop until I wanted to. He just said be careful and told him he loves me and will help me if I need it. He made it no big deal. So it wasn't I sort of 'fell' out of it. It just didn't matter enough to me.

My father's idea was, you're going to do it anyway, if you don't oh well, but if you do, talk to me. He always invited honesty. He just wanted to know 'where' we were, if that makes sense. No subject is off limits with my father and I. (NONE!) I love him more for that and I try hard to make him proud. It's been that way since i was knee high. With that sort of support (and I needed it growing up with my eye colors) I never really strayed too far for too long.

But talk about an open book!! WHEW! everything is open to discussion. I think parents are mostly in denial. Not MY kid. The fact is I dont think half of the parents today even know their kids. Not enough time for various legitament reasons.

DISCIPLINE. I got it. I was terrified my father would hit me. It wasn't till I was around 25 before I realized I could count the times he's hit me on one hand. Threaten me???!??! Oh yeah, big time and scary like. But actually follow through, not often. But these days it borders on illegal. *shrug*

yabbo: good question. I think if he was involved in a club or team sport it would have helped him choose a different road. He would have not met the other students doing drugs which would have meant he wouldnt have started taking the drugs which would have led him to finishing HS and going to college instead of going to rehab.

I think after school programs are a big impact because they keep the student involved in something, being with students with similiar interests and away from the peer pressure of doing drugs.

I am studying consumer behavior right now. A lot of the theories are actually psychology based.

What I think is kids are MORE influenced by their reference groups- their peers, their friends.

They can think 'say no to drugs', but if all their friends are doing drugs, and it is important for them to comply 'go along with' their friends, then they will.

I think in order for kids to do what they think is right, instead of comply with their friends' desire, you have to chip away at the kid's motivation and willingness to conform.

I agree, Withthisring...it's not a guarantee and there will be those parents who think they're doing right by their children and who seem to be doing the best they can, and somehow, the kids just end up bad. However, I also think that there are parents who think they are doing what's best for their children, but all the while, they are pushing their kids into rebellion. For instance, my parents were overbearingly over-protective. We never had a good relationship when I was growing up and they didn't have a good relationship with my sister either. My parents can be incredibly judgemental (especially my mother) and feel that her values and opinions are the only correct ones, and if ours didn't match up, we were f*cked up. There's a difference between always knowing where your kids are and calling your child at 7 in the morning at college when they didn't call you back the day before, demanding to know where they were and the phone numbers of all of their friends on campus so that they could be found in an emergency. There's a difference between not allowing your child to close their door at night when they're younger so that the parents can hear if something happens, and not allowing your teenage or adult child close the door because they must be hiding something.

Bottom line...there's no perfect way of parenting. There's a fine line between not being involved enough and neglect and a fine line between being active in a child's life and being oppressive. However, I think the problem is that parents just don't take the same time and energy that they devote to other areas of their lives, for example, work, as Alina stated, and devote that time to their family and getting to know their kids and making that as much a full-time job as the one that pays a salary. I don't even know if that's humanly possible. Just a stream of consciousness on my part, I guess, but you get the gist.

I actually think that placing the blame on parenting and the home environment has given teenagers that out to do whatever they want and then complain about their home life. The bottom line is that by the age of 14 and 15 kids start to to make their own decisions. I have great parents, but that didn't stop my from making bad decisions along the way.

I also have a brother that began using drugs during his freshman year of high school and has gone down a very bad path since. He was a good student and he was being groomed as the next track superstar at Centerach High School (at that time the track team had gone undefeated for 20 years or so and it was a big deal to the school). The coaches did everything they could, along with my family. He was allowed to practice even when he couldn't compete due to his grades. But he was just swept under.

And any chance he got he would make up these horrible stories about my parents and my siblings (never me for some reason) to try to shift the blame on others.

I think the best you can do for kids is to teach them when they are very young what the effects of a drug addiction can be. They need to have people come in who have been seriously effected by drug addiction. Like a sibling of someone who died as a result of drug addiction. They need to know that you can't always just kick the habit and then live a happy life. I think kids are shown the 'recovered' addicts which makes it seem like they can do drugs and then turn their life around when they fell like it. By the time they are in high school they think they know everything and the warnings go over their heads. Maybe if my brother had known the darker side when he was younger, he would not have made the choices that he made.

thanks everyone for your opinions...keep them coming...


heres another question....what can the schools do do help in this issue...be it getting parents involved, stopping bullying, rewarding academics?


thanks...I love everyone's perspectives...

I think to some degree schools and teachers need more disciplinary power, not in terms of suspension or detention (which I think is stupid), but in terms of being more proactive in notifying parents of bad behavior, and possibly assigning additional homework work to those who mis-behave in class.

i think some type of student counsling should be involved with schools. When i was in HS i was a peer mediator and involved in SPECDA (School Program to Edecute and Control Drug Abuse)

we had meetings once a week during the day (with an ok to be excused from class from the teacher) and we would just talk. We talked abour our feelings, grades, peer pressure, things that went on at home, friends, family, etc...

I kept calling it therapy. It was really great. I sat with kids my own age going through what I was going through and we were there for each other. We had each others phone numbers if their were problems we could count on each other to be our support.

I think if more counsling sessions or programs where students can help each other were available then students would possibly feel that they have someone to turn to who understands instead of someone who may judge or criticize.

Hmm I was bullied big time as a teenager. I was teased from head to toe and if I didnt put myself in private therapy, I could definitley have pulled a Coloumbine. Kids are mean and I beleive teachers and school psychologist need to intervene not just one on one but address the whole school.

Teachers and school faculty always know what kids are being tormented and do nothing. Kids are ridiculed even more when they do go to the therapist office in school.

Its awful, I think parents, kids and faculty staff need to be more vocal and not treat certain issues like Taboo.

wacky... thatnks for your post...do you think if teachers were asked to identify possible students who were being bullied and those studetns were able to meet together in group discussion it would help?

more questions:
what type of discipline should there be for a student who bullies?
brings drugs on campus?
comes to school under the influence?
sells drugs?