David Lunn Jr. was a teenager when he first went to a DARE assembly for his school. David learned about the different types of drugs and why it's so important to say no. Unfortunately, the program hooked him with heroin. Throughout the assembly, heroin was on his mind because the program made the drug seem fun. He began using heroin until his craving for drugs led him to opiates. David had a promising life as a professional basketball player until he became addicted to opiates. He would soon end up dying alone, his body pressed against the basement door of a dilapidated building. This story is just one of many people who had a promising life ahead of them, but whose life was cut short due to an opiate overdose. Change is necessary to protect the lives of others. By minimizing social resistance to drug use and refocusing anti-drug education on science, these programs will be more effective and reduce drug abuse among adolescents. Say no to plagiarism. Get a tailor-made essay on “Why Violent Video Games Should Not Be Banned”? Get an Original Essay The key aspect discussed is that drug programs don't work. Programs like DARE, the Just Say No campaign and others have failed to convince children to stop taking opiates. Children are more likely to take the drugs they are taught to avoid. According to Professor Bernard Bard, "There is no evidence that the high school programs observed reduced illegal drug use...the programs actually encouraged drug use." The excerpt that contained this sentence was written forty-six years ago and is still relevant today, which poses a huge problem. Bernard Bard also discovered that the California State Department of Education had written a report on the drug programs of several high schools. Evidence collected showed an extraordinarily high level of drug use after the program in half of the schools. This data reveals how current drug programs are not working in many schools and are making the drug situation worse. Not only can teenagers be encouraged to use drugs, but they could potentially move on to worse drugs if society does not fix the drug education that children receive. David Heitz, a writer for rehab centers, has documented a new wave of teenage drug addicts who are mixing drugs with marijuana and alcohol, and some have even ended up injecting heroin. Teenagers have lost the battle against opioid addiction and the number of adolescent opioid users is increasing. A group of pediatric professors even found more evidence that more children are using opiates and continuing to use them into adulthood. Richard Miech, one of the pediatric professors participating in the study, states that "legitimate opioid use before high school graduation is independently associated with a 33% increase in risk of future abuse." of opioids after high school. This statistic shows that the DARE program has done nothing to help students and guide them to make better decisions. With minimal positive results, adolescent participation in drug programs reveals that these types of programs do not work. As a society, the goal is to protect each other, but this is notnot realized. Teenagers continue to become addicted to harmful drugs and overdose on opiates. Something must be done to protect young people in society. On the positive side, one solution to the opioid problem is to make anti-drug programs more scientific. People think that focusing only on morality will bring about change, but that is not true. The moral route has failed and now it is time to try adding a different technique to the program. Applying science to these programs, using research and studies to create a better program, is an answer to this problem. A study by pediatric doctors concluded that "emotion regulation appears to create a dual ability to avoid substance abuse and help control the temptation to relapse, which is a type of tendency-avoidance conflict." Armed with this information, doctors began to investigate this hypothesis further. In the early 2000s, pediatricians and preventive doctors created keepin' it REAL, a new training course. Keepin', it REAL differs from DARE by replacing drug lectures with interactive lessons. Interactive lessons feature stories from addicts and family members of people who have overdosed to help teens make wise decisions. The program has reduced the number of teenage drug addicts. Keepin', it REAL had over time created an anti-drug mindset among students during its initial trials. These doctors even discovered that "behavioral scientists began to suggest a different approach as early as 1998, based on the search for effective behavior change techniques." The proposed solution is not only effective, but it is also scientifically proven. The School Health Council and Committee on Substance Abuse reported that the number of middle and high school students who use illicit drugs has steadily declined. These statistics show that the keepin' it REAL program has shown improvements in the number of students taking these illicit drugs. The moral path has done nothing for students, but this approach still offers hope. While some may argue that eliminating drug programs in schools can also be beneficial, it is not the best solution. Children will always be influenced to take opiates in one way or another, whether through peer pressure or school. Without teaching teens about the dangers of opiates, they may be even more likely to take them. Doctors advocate the use of certain programs designed for schools and proven to be effective. Curricula provide information to students in a way that piques their interests, makes the curriculum interactive, and is developmentally appropriate for each grade level. Finding an anti-drug program that teaches students a different perspective is a better solution than eliminating the program altogether. Pediatricians emphasized that “studies have convincingly demonstrated that the effects of school programs can be significantly amplified when community elements are added.” The greater the effort put into these drug programs, the more likely they are to work. An example of this is how the DARE program continued to work on how to better communicate with students and ended up combining its efforts with a new researcher-created program. The new program has a website aimed at helping adolescents, based on previous work, which demonstrates how teaching communication and life skills can have a.