Parents: Do Your Homework for a Drug-Free School Year

Going back to school signifies a time of new beginnings – new schools, classes, and friends. It can also be a time of new challenges for many young people when it comes to drugs. Every day, approximately 4,700 American youth ages 12-17 try marijuana for the first time. And more than one out of twenty (5.4 percent) students in grades 9-12 smoke marijuana on school property.

The transition from middle to high school is a particularly risky time for teens, putting them at an increased risk for drug use.

The most dramatic increase in first-time marijuana use occurs between the ages of 12 and 13, the time of transition from middle school to high school, and continues to climb significantly, peaking at age 15 before leveling off.

Lifetime marijuana use increases more than sevenfold between the ages of 12 and 14 (from 2 percent to 15 percent).

The percentage of kids who have tried drugs doubles between 8 th and 10 th grade, from 18 percent to 36 percent. During this same grade transition, disapproval of marijuana use declines significantly between 8th and 10th grade from 82 to 68 percent.

Highly stressed teens are twice as likely as teens with a low level of stress to smoke, drink, get drunk and use illegal drugs. Nearly one in three girls and one in four boys report being highly stressed.

Parents tend to over estimate their child’s anti-drug attitudes and under estimate their exposure to drugs and actual drug use, mistakenly believing their child is not at risk.