Kiley Stevenson has been named the winner of the D.A.R.E. essay competition at Weston High School. Throughout the 2020-2021 school year, the 5th graders of Jackson Parish have been participating in the D.A.R.E. program, brought to them by the Jackson Parish Sheriff’s Office.
At the end of each program, for students to successfully complete the program, they must complete their workbook and a D.A.R.E. essay. The D.A.R.E essay must include topics taught in the program, how they have used Define, Assess, Respond and Evaluate methods and how they plan to use everything they have learned in the future.
Once students have completed the essays, there is an essay picked out of each homeroom (three 5th grade classes per school) and one overall winner from each school. The essays of these 3 winning students will be on display at the Court House, Jonesboro Library and the New Sheriff’s Office through the summer.
The Drug Abuse Resistance Education program (or D.A.R.E.) was founded in 1983 and was solely focused on teaching the dangers of drugs and alcohol on the body and family. As times have changed, D.A.R.E has added more lessons to the program to help prepare students for what life throws at them. To today, D.A.R.E now stands for, Define, Assess, Respond, and Evaluate.
See below for Stevenson’s thought provoking and award winning submittal:
The D.A.R.E Decision making model teachers students like me to not do drugs, vape, tobacco or alcohol. Our D.A.R.E. officer, Mrs. Lindsey, has helped me and my class learn new things about drugs, vaping, tobacco and alcohol and how it can affect our bodies. The “D” in D.A.R.E stands for Define, which means to see what the problem is. The “A” is assess which means to see what your options are. The “R” means to respond or to choose an answer. The “E” means to evaluate which means to see what would happen when you made your decision what to do.
Alcohol is illegal for anyone under the age of 21. Mixing alcohol with medicine is dangerous. There are 88,000 alcohol related deaths each year in the U.S. Most teens don’t drink alcohol. Alcohol slows down the brain and body. This effects your memory loss and slow reflexes. There are more than 200 known harmful chemicals in cigarette smoke. Nicotine in cigarettes and chewing tobacco reduces the amount of blood that flows to the brain.
The people in my help network are my mom, my cousin, my aunt, the police, firefighters, and the ambulance workers. My grandma, Anna, Davynee and my teachers are also in my help network. If one of my family members or friends need help then I will ask what is wrong and will help them find a solution.
There are 5 ways to resist drugs and alcohol. One way is avoiding the situation. If you know why where people often use drugs, stay away from those places. The second strategy is strength is in numbers. Hang around with non-users, especially where drug use is expected. A third strategy is walking away. If someone says, “I found a cigarette in my mom’s purse, wanna smoke?” say no walk away. A fourth strategy is saying no while giving a reason. If someone offers you a beer, you could say “No, my parents would kill me!” The last strategy is changing the subject. If someone says, “I have some beer, want some?” say “No, lets play hide and seek.”
Possible ways my body feels when I am stressed is frustrated, my head hurts and I’m crying. It I’m stressed then I start acting different and my face turns red. Some things that I do to relieve stress is listen to music and watch tv.
There are 5 ways to report bullying. Who, what, when, where and why. One safe way to report bullying is by telling an adult or teacher when the bully cant see you. There is cyberbullying which is on email or a text and there is verbal bullying which is used with words in person.
In conclusion, I have learned a lot of things in D.A.R.E that will help me make the right decisions in life as I get older and am in different situation with drugs and alcohol.
Kiley Stevenson
