Issue link: http://educator.cta.org/i/72908
Monica Mallet shows students photos of celebrities who have died from substance abuse. LET'S GET PHYSICAL: Brain damage and bullying of passage that is inevitable. Sometimes, parents may be using drugs. "We have meth here and it's ugly, Shasta Secondary Employees Association president. "You can drive 20 minutes into the middle of nowhere and people are cooking it up. It's amazing how many mari- juana 'scripts' [prescription cards] kids have access to. All you need is a hangnail and 250 bucks to get one. Substance abuse affects the most prestigious college " says Tom Roberts, " prep schools as well as disadvantaged students in pov- erty-stricken areas. Upscale communities are impacted by the drug epidemic. Teens are using legal designer drugs such as Spice, linked to the hospitalization of celebrity Demi Moore. "Peer pressure is huge here, and students think it's the norm," says Diane Farthing, a ninth-grade health teacher at Amador Valley High School in Pleasanton. "Our community has very high academic standards and high expectations that students will go to college. So you need a high GPA, plus you need to be involved in multiple activities like sports, scouts and volunteer work. Students sometimes feel they need to blow off a little steam on Sat- urday night. They get drunk or high." Farthing, an Association of Pleasanton Teachers mem- DIANE FARTHING tells students something many already know: The reason people do drugs is because it feels good — even though the consequences are bad. She asks students to join hands and form circles. ber, agrees parents can be part of the problem. "Many students never party during the week, but on weekend nights they do. Parents think that as long as the kids don't drive, it's OK." She explains that the nervous system is composed of billions of cells called neurons that transmit impulses to other neurons. Students are assigned to play the role of neurotransmitters (chemical mes- sengers), synapses, axons and dendrites to demonstrate how the nervous system works and they touch hands in rapid succession mimicking components of the brain transmitting information. "Drugs can cause permanent changes within the neurotrans- mitters or receptors. People who use drugs may never feel normal again — even if they stop," she tells students. "And your brain is still growing. Research shows the part of the brain responsible for judgment and impulse control is not fully developed by adolescence, so the teenage brain is more sensi- tive to the damaging effects from drugs. That can affect normal brain development and increases the risk of addiction." "Drugs activate the prefrontal cortex, which is Diane Farthing the brain's reward center," explains Farthing. "But drinking and drugs can cause car accidents, which is the number one cause of death among teenagers. Being intoxicated can lead to bad decisions, such as having unprotected sex, that can lead to preg- nancy or disease. You think 'It won't happen to me,' because part of being a teenager is thinking that you are invincible." June/July 2012 www.cta.org 11