EFFORTS SHOULD IMPROVE DRUG EDUCATION

Providing more education to young people in our schools always ranks high when people list possible solutions for addressing Daviess County's growing drug problem.

But what some fail to realize is that it's not a matter of simply exposing kids to the dangers of drugs and alcohol.  That's already happening, with varying degrees of success.  The feel-good nature of some programs has helped to hide the fact that they aren't having much impact on students' lives.

What this community has lacked until recently is data on student behavior - -- information about what substances kids are using and at what age usage begins to spike.  And that's made it difficult to tailor education programs to meet specific needs.

That's why the Kentucky Incentive Project -- a survey that city, county and Catholic schools took in 2002 -- was so important.  Among its many findings, it helped to show that the chances of a student using drugs or alcohol increased greatly between the eighth and 10th grades.

The true benefits of this study, however, will be realized if Owensboro and Daviess County public schools follow through on a plan to coordinate their drug awareness and prevention curricula.  If everything goes as planned, the districts will begin offering LifeSkills Training in the fall.  And Owensboro Catholic Schools is using a different, but equally effective, program called Smart Moves.

The curriculum is supported by many in the local prevention community because it's science based, meaning its effectiveness is measured by both research and accountability measures.  Its target audience locally will be seventh, eighth and ninth graders.

Ideally, science-based curriculum will eventually be incorporated into earlier grades as well, but for now, LifeSkills will target the middle and early high school years, because that's where the KIP study has shown usage begins to increase.

Consider that 3 percent of eighth-graders report drinking alcohol 40 or more times, compared with 14 percent of 10th-graders.  For marijuana usage 40 or more times, the number is 2 percent for eighth-graders and 11 percent for 10th-graders.  And 4 percent of eighth-graders smoke compared with 16 percent of 10th-graders.  That number is important, because cigarettes are considered a potential gateway to alcohol and drugs.

To be certain, education and prevention are just a small part of the effort needed to address this community's drug problems.  Equal attention must be given to enforcement, treatment and recovery.

But it's encouraging to see the local school systems not only coordinating their efforts, but also investing the limited resources available in programs that prevention specialists believe will really have an impact in steering kids away from drugs and alcohol.