“Lapus stresses: ‘These efforts will bring us closer to our goal of zero drug use among our 22 million elementary and high school students under the care of DepEd.’”
by Ducky Paredes
Clearly, when the Department of Education (DepEd) began its Random Drug Testing (RDT) Program, it was not something that was generally welcomed. This came out of fears, bordering on paranoia (without adequate empirical data) that illegal drugs had taken such a hold on the population that it had reached into even our elementary and high schools.
The Commission on Human Rights suggested that the program violated human rights. That view was completely ignored. In fact, mandatory drug tests also became a sine qua non for getting a driver’s license and other such licenses from government. The CHR chair cited specific provisions in the Constitution as well as that of the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child that would be violated by this executive order. A former UP Law Dean suggested that there was no legal basis for random drug testing; the President of the Pamantasan ng Lungsod ng Maynila shared the same view.
In fact, as in the mandatory substance abuse testing of driver license applicants, the prevalence of drug use has turned out so small as to be insignificant. Although there could be errors in drug tests conducted by commercial centers doing the tests on drivers for a fee, the tests done on our students by the Department of Health itself have come up with similar results.
Education Secretary Jesli Lapus reports that the department’s Random Drug Testing (RDT) Program has been done on 96% of the 874 high schools in the National Capital Region. Department of Health analysts resulting discovered only 26 students confirmed to be using drugs. And excepting for Region XII and ARMM, school divisions in 14 other regions were also visited by the RDT teams in 2009.
Overall, the nationwide testing in public and private secondary schools showed that of 29,059 students tested, only 72 were confirmed positive of drug use or a prevalence rate of 0.24%. That is less than one percent, with just slightly over a third of confirmed cases found at the NCR. Sp, can we now get over our paranoia and stop worrying over illegal drug use ands stop these tests?
Despite such a negligible result, Jesli Lapus says that the National Drug Education Program (NDEP) will continue. This integrates drug prevention concepts in appropriate subject and learning areas of both elementary and secondary levels, as well as the alternative learning system and co-curricular activities, Lapus stresses: “These efforts will bring us closer to our goal of zero drug use among our 22 million elementary and high school students under the care of DepEd.”
As part of the follow-through, Lapus says that the NDEP coordinators work closely with principals whose schools have confirmed positive cases as well as local government units, and concerned government and non-government organizations to monitor the program’s implementation and come up with specific interventions.
It is these interventions and best practices that should interest us most. By itself, random drug testing is a policing practice. It attempts to ferret out an existing, hidden problem. This makes the users realize that they will be found out, at the same time that non-users are deterred by the prevailing atmosphere of vigilance. Hopefully, preventive measures and interventions will prove productive and more enduring in the long term.
One such measure is after-school activity. According to research studies in the United States, “drug use and other dangerous behavior occur during the unsupervised hours between the end of classes and parents’ arrival home in the evening.” That is why extracurricular activities like sports or membership in an organization devoted to wholesome goals — and preferably sanctioned by schools — can fill in an idle-therefore-prone-to-mischief moments. Research also shows that students who participate in extracurricular activities are less likely to indulge in drugs and violent crime. Conversely, they are more likely to continue studying, earn higher grades and target more ambitious educational goals.
After-school activities provide students who are just beginning to dabble with drugs, a means by which they can consult teachers, coaches and peers who can lead them away from deviant and destructive behavior.
According to a 2003 study sponsored by the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation in the US, “the strongest predictor of student drug use is students’ attitudes towards drug use and their perception of peer use.” The study’s authors recommend that policies be crafted to address “these key values, attitudes and perceptions.”
Drug use, after all, does not arise in a vacuum. There are always precedents: depression, anxiety, peer pressure, an unstable family life. Unless these factors are brought up to the surface, how can they be addressed? By encouraging student-teacher trust, by building mentoring relationships that develop when engaged in a productive activity, schools can help.
We’re all familiar with the time-worn Hollywood theme of the experienced elder, who earns the trust of young misfits and leads them to heights of success — in sports, music, dance or the academe. And typically, these same youngsters are portrayed casting off their unproductive behavior or lifestyle and are redeemed. Clichés? Of course they are; but the reason clichés endure is because they happen so often that results have become predictable.
Getting our schools involved in the lives of the 22 million students under their care may be the greater achievement coming out of the Radom Drug Testing Program. How to institutionalize this involvement is the challenge that, if properly met will eliminate one of the most insidious threat to our young.
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With the rest of Philippine media, I mourn the loss of Press Secretary Cerge Remonde, who was someone who had the best interests of Philippine journalism in mind in everything he did. A provincial radio broadcaster in Cebuano, he moved into the big leagues when he was elected National Chairman of the Kapisanan ng mga Brodkaster ng Pilipinas (KBP), and the first KBP chair to be elected to a sixth term.
Cerge was a good man. One immediately took to him. This was easy since the man was humble, caring and involved in his work but not its trappings. As they say, “You can take the Cebuano out of Cebu but not Cebu out of the Cebuano.”
Cerge was, at heart, a media man, more than he was a government man. That made him a good press secretary who, maybe, put too much of himself into the job, which is really the only way to do that job well.
Good-bye, my friend.
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hvp 01.21.10
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