Parents Blind to Rising School Drug Use

Aug. 16, 2007 -- Drug use in the nation’s schools is increasing and parents are not aware of the extent of the problem, a new survey suggests.

Drugs and alcohol have become so common in the nation’s middle and high schools that for many students, “school days have become school daze,” the well-known head of a leading substance abuse research group says.

Joseph A. Califano Jr., who served as health secretary during the Carter administration, tells WebMD that parents, school administrators, and government officials need to “wake up to the reality of increasingly drug-infested schools.”

Califano’s remarks coincide with the release of a survey designed to track attitudes and behaviors of teens and parents regarding substance abuse in the nation’s schools.

Based on survey responses, researchers concluded that 80% of the nation’s high school students and 44% of middle-schoolers have personally seen illegal drugs used or sold and/or students drunk or high on the grounds of their schools.

The survey was conducted by the National Center on Addiction and Substance Abuse (CASA) at Columbia University, which Califano founded and directs.

“This fall more than 16 million teens will return to middle and high schools where drug dealing, possession, use, and students high on alcohol or drugs are part of the fabric of their school,” Califano says.

“Parents should wake up to this reality and realize that more likely than not, your teen is going to school each day in a building where drug use, sale, and possession are as much a part of the curriculum as math or English.”

Drugs in School Survey

The survey included 1,063 teens between the ages of 12 and 17 and 550 parents of teens, half of whom had children who also completed the survey.

Teens were asked if drugs were “used, kept, or sold” at their schools. Based on these answers, schools were considered either “drug free” or “drug infested.”

Also based on the survey answers, researchers concluded that drug use in middle and high schools is on the rise.

The number of students who said they attended schools where drugs are used, kept, or sold increased by 20% between 2006 and 2007 among high-schoolers and 35% among middle-schoolers.

“This is a real increase,” Califano tells WebMD. “And the trend was the same regardless of where the school was or whether it was public or private.”

In fact, the biggest increases in drug exposure were reported in private middle and high schools.

There was a 38% reported increase between 2006 and 2007 in teens attending private high schools who are exposed to drugs at school, compared with a 16% increase among teens attending public high schools.

“Here in New York City the private schools are riddled with drugs, and it is the same in Washington, D.C., and other major cities,” Califano says. “There is no safe harbor for kids.”