|
A different approach and more lessons are desperately needed in a bid to stop secondary school children turning to drink and drugs, it is claimed.
The call has come after new figures showed that 20% of pupils have tried drugs, 25% drink alcohol and 10% smoke regularly.
The annual survey, carried out by the Information Centre for Health and Social Care, also claimed that use levels have not dropped in the last five years despite increased attention being directed to the problems.
Education charity Drugsline says that schools do not have enough drugs education lessons to make an impact and the approach used often doesn’t get through to students.
Drugsline, based in east London, employs former addicts who go into schools to talk with children and answer questions.
Operations director Christina Ball says: “The children are really engaged in these lessons, they ask lots of questions and they get honest answers.”
The survey, carried out by the Information Centre for Health and Social Care, interviewed 9,000 children aged 11 to 15 from 305 schools.
Results show that 6% of 11-year-olds have taken drugs in the last year, compared with 33% of 15-year-olds, while 6% of pupils use drugs at least once a month.
Boys said they drank an average of 11.5 units a week, compared with 9.5 for girls. Girls were smoking more though, with 10% saying they smoked regularly, compared with 7% of boys.
Chief executive at the centre, professor Denise Lievesley, says the data will be made available to those tackling these issues.
She adds: “The survey illustrates that the levels of use of drugs, drink and cigarettes by children aged 11 to 15 have remained constant for the last five years despite attention to these behaviours.”
Ms Ball says more lessons are needed with a combination of the traditional approach to drugs education and projects such as Drugsline.
She says: “The education we provide is different because they’re ex-users of drugs speaking from their own experiences and the children can relate to them.
“Schools need a combination of approaches and far more education. Actually most schools have only one drugs education lesson a term or a year, they need far, far more.”
Ms Ball says alcohol and smoking is the biggest problem they encounter. She adds that children also smoke a lot of cannabis.
The Drugsline website says of its education outreach programme: “The students we speak to are often disturbed by what they hear and we urge them to share their experiences and support each other in fighting the drugs culture.
“The benefits of these classroom sessions are unmistakable – students are given time to explore their feelings and emotions and learn how, if not controlled, these can cause them to slip into substance abuse.”
Drugsline covers a large portion of east London and Essex, but schools UK-wide are welcome to get in touch for advice and information.
Visit www.drugsline.org or ring 020 8554 3220.
http://www.sec-ed.co.uk/cgi-bin/go.pl/news/article.html?uid=1357
|
