From: [w--li--h] at [ix.netcom.com](William House)
Newsgroups: talk.politics.drugs,uk.legal,uk.politics
Subject: DARE doesn't work.  (Was: Drug Education Does Not Prevent Use)
Date: 6 Apr 1996 12:34:44 GMT

DARE doesn't work.
http://www.hyperreal.com/drugs/politics/dare/dare.doesnt.work

STUDIES FIND DRUG PROGRAM NOT EFFECTIVE

Yet high-level supporters argue "it's better to have it than not have
it."
by Dennis Cauchon
USA TODAY, 11 October 1993

In just 10 years, D.A.R.E. has grown into the USA's No.  1 drug
education program, reaching 5 million fifth-graders in 60% of school
districts.    The Drug Abuse Resistance Education logo --"D.A.R.E. To
Keep Kids Off Drugs" -- is on bumper stickers, T-shirts, even Kentucky
Fried Chicken boxes.  Police, taxpayers and business give $700 million
a year.  It's also a favorite of dozens of members of Congress.

But a raft of scientific studies says D.A.R.E., the 17-week
course taught by uniformed police, doesn't achieve its main long-term
goal: stopping kids from smoking pot, drinking booze or using other
drugs. "I've got nothing against D.A.R.E., but we need to get some
white light on this issue so we can wisely decide how to spend our
money and on what programs," says Tom Colthurst, who recently
organized a national conference on drug education at the University of
California-San Diego.   But D.A.R.E. executive director Glenn Levant
calls the studies flawed and not comprehensive:  "Scientists, will
tell you bumble bees can't fly, but we know they can." Levant says a
proper national study would cost $3 million- $5 million and take seven
years to finish.

Studies have focused mostly on specific cities, and cost
several hundred thousand dollars each. Experts agree recent research
on D.A.R.E. is not perfect: It is difficult and expensive to measure
the behavior of large numbers of children over several years.     But
they say the research is better than studies on other drug programs.
"Almost every researcher would agree there's enough information
to judge D.A.R.E.," says Rand Corp. researcher Phyllis Ellickson. "
It's well-established that D.A.R.E. doesn't work," says Gilbert Botvin
of the Institute for Prevention at Cornell University Medical Center.

Created in 1983 under the direction of former Los Angeles Police
chief Daryl Gates, D.A.R.E.  exploded after the Bush administration
gave it heavy federal subsidies.  The program uses lectures, role
playing and other techniques to teach children to avoid drugs. And by
all accounts, the kids who take the course and the police who teach it
think it's terrific. D.A.R.E.  "does no harm and by far, nothing but
good," says Scott Mandel, a Los Angeles-area teacher. "D.A.R.E. really
works," says Mike Miller, Round Rock, Texas, police officer and
D.A.R.E. teacher.  "Surveys from across the nation show kids who take
the D.A.R.E. course are much less likely to use drugs later in life."

That's not what most studies show. To investigate D.A.R.E.'s
effectiveness, researchers looked at two similar groups of children:
One group takes D.A.R.E.; the other does not. Then, researchers
followed the children's behavior for several years.  Since 1987,
studies -- most funded by law enforcement agencies involved in the
program -- have been conducted at 20 North Carolina schools;
31 Kentucky schools; 11 South Carolina schools; 36 Illinois schools;
and 11 Canadian schools.

The results were similar. The 1991 Kentucky study, the National
Institute on Drug Abuse reported, found "no statistically significant
differences between experimental groups and control groups in the
percentage of new users of ... cigarettes, smokeless tobacco, alcohol,
marijuana." A 1990 study funded by the Canadian government found
"D.A.R.E. had no significant effect on the students' use of any of the
substances measured....They included:  tobacco, beer, pop, marijuana,
acid, Valium, wine, aspirin, uppers, downers, heroin, crack (cocaine),
liquor, candy, glue and PCP."

To make sense of the various studies, the Justice Department hired the
Research Triangle Institute of Durham, N.C., to conduct a
statistical analysis of all D.A.R.E. research.    A preliminary report
from the RTI -- analyzing eight studies involving 9,500 children --
says D.A.R.E. has "a limited to essentially non-existent effect" on
drug use. D.A.R.E. did have a positive effect on children's knowledge
and attitudes about drugs, the report says.  It also added the social
skills needed to say no to drugs. But even on these measures, D.A.R.E.
didn't do as well as other drug programs, including local classes
taught by teachers and students.

D.A.R.E. America has launched a behind-the-scenes lobbying
campaign against the final RTI report, due in November.  "We're
working with D.A.R.E. to ... voice their concerns," says Winnie Reed,
the National Institute of Justice official over seeing the study.
The pressure has angered some academic researchers. "It's repugnant,
out of line and very unusual," says Dennis Rosenbaum, director of the
Center for Research in Law and Justice at the University of Illinois-
Chicago.  Rosenbaum -- a D.A.R.E.  supporter -- says the group is its
own worst enemy because it has spent so much effort attacking the
evaluations, rather than learning from research. Even some state and
local D.A.R.E. programs are backing away from D.A.R.E. America's
fight.  "If we aren't getting the job done, we ought to be man enough
to try something else," says Tim DeRosa of the Illinois state police
and long-time D.A.R.E. activist.

Some government officials are aware of D.A.R.E.'s shortcomings.
"Research shows that, no, D.A.R.E.  hasn't been effective in
reducing drug use," says William Modzeleski, the top drug official at
the Department of Education. The department has considered asking
Congress to repeal a law requiring states to give D.A.R.E. a total of
$10 million or more a year from federal Drug Free Schools money.  But
D.A.R.E. continues to have high-level government support.

On Sept. 9 -- National D.A.R.E. Day by congressional decree --
D.A.R.E. officials and students lunched with dozens of Congress
members and met Attorney General Janet Reno.  Later, they visited
first lady Hillary Rodham Clinton. Drug czar Lee Brown, who started
the program in Houston when he was police chief, remains a booster.
"My experience has been positive," Brown says.  "The research
has pointed in many different directions, but my conclusion is it's
better to have it than not have it.  I know first-hand that young
people are impressed by it and look up to the D.A.R.E. officer as a
role model."

Yet many drug education experts fear that D.A.R.E.'s political clout
is siphoning drug education money from better programs. "D.A.R.E. has
a following and sales force that is extremely powerful in fighting for
scarce resources," says University of Michigan researcher Lloyd
Johnston, who conducts the government's survey of teen drug use.
"But its growth is totally out of scale to its effectiveness."
Johnston and others aren't sure why D.A.R.E.  isn't working better.
Some think it targets children too young; some thin k teachers
and older students get better results than uniformed police; others
say the program relies on psychological theories that don't work.
Levant thinks critics are just jealous of D.A.R.E.'s success. "We're
like apple pie," he says.  "But I guess you can always find some one
who doesn't like apple pie."-

DARE doesn't work.
http://www.hyperreal.com/drugs/politics/dare/dare.doesnt.work