Second overdose at Kennedy

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:This school is very poorly rated, its sad but not a surprise

https://www.greatschools.org/maryland/silver-spring/911-John-F.-Kennedy-High-School/

Seriously? And you think that school ratings and drug usage are linked? They are not.

BCC girls found passed out in the bathroom.

https://wtop.com/local/2023/01/two-students-found-passed-out-in-high-school-bathroom/

BCC is rated higher. This has nothing to do with low income and ratings

BCC is not a W school

Can we just agree that drug use is not an issue unique to schools with either high or low FARMS rates and instead focus on what appears to be a pretty shocking uptick in kids dying from drug use at school?

I suspect there is a multi-pronged response needed, including but not limited to hard reduction measures such as educating kids about fentanyl and allowing students to carry Narcan. What else?

Staff should administer Narcan not minors.

The UK has a big drug problem as well. I was just there and all the taxis and buses had advertisements on how to help stop the epidemic - one of the tips was that everyone should carry around Narcan.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:This school is very poorly rated, its sad but not a surprise

https://www.greatschools.org/maryland/silver-spring/911-John-F.-Kennedy-High-School/

Seriously? And you think that school ratings and drug usage are linked? They are not.

BCC girls found passed out in the bathroom.

https://wtop.com/local/2023/01/two-students-found-passed-out-in-high-school-bathroom/

BCC is rated higher. This has nothing to do with low income and ratings

BCC is not a W school

Can we just agree that drug use is not an issue unique to schools with either high or low FARMS rates and instead focus on what appears to be a pretty shocking uptick in kids dying from drug use at school?

I suspect there is a multi-pronged response needed, including but not limited to hard reduction measures such as educating kids about fentanyl and allowing students to carry Narcan. What else?

Staff should administer Narcan not minors.

I don't know, I'm on Team The First Available Person Who Can Administer Narcan Should Do So. Speaking of which: https://mocoshow.com/blog/family-forum-on-fentanyl-life-saving-narcan-training-at-clarksburg-high-school/

100%. My husband and I went to the Montgomery County health department's Zoom Narcan training last night, and I recommend it to everyone here. It was free and they will mail Narcan to your house for free once you complete it.

There were quite a few parent/child pairs on the Zoom. One of the kids shared that a friend of his had died of a fentanyl overdose administered via vape.

Find and sign up for a training here:
https://www.montgomerycountymd.gov/opioids/save-a-life.html

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The parents who think it’s MCPS fault for not monitoring their kids every minute at school are the same ones who complain if teachers limit hall passes to one at a time or the school takes the doors off the bathrooms to discourage kids from congregating there.

There's only so much a school can do, and if some students choose to break the law, their bad choices are hardly MCPS' fault. However, I do think regular schools shouldn't have to deal with this sort of thing, and when there are students who are known to have serious issues, they should be isolated from ordinary students and enrolled in a place that can better help with their problems.

Regular schools and ordinary students use drugs too. This is a nationwide issue, which is now trickling down to the schools.

You know that the PP was talking about kids who are actively and repeatedly abusing substances at school vs those who aren't.

How would you even know! You don't know until someone is caught or overdoses. Come on now. It even affects honor roll students and athletes. This has been tearing the country apart for a years. Now it's getting to wealthier populations.

[Anonymous]

What is the logic behind how the stories about these ODs don’t indicate what kind of drugs the kids were taking?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:What is the logic behind how the stories about these ODs don’t indicate what kind of drugs the kids were taking?

Student privacy and I assume hippa.

[Anonymous]

It is really dangerous to believe that only “bad” kids are using drugs or even distributing them in school. The data is clear that the fentanyl crisis hits all economic statuses equally. The problem I have been seeing is that we are in an era where everything is someone’s fault. We sue for the most ridiculous reasons. Now, we want yo expect high school teachers to be allowed (and I really don’t think they should be) to sit inside of the bathroom and watch the students? That would inane in elementary school, none the less high school. Quite frankly, kids know that there is a level of privacy in bathrooms because teachers can not simply enter and there are no cameras.

By 14, all children should understand the risks of drugs. They should know what an overdose looks like and they should be very knowledgeable about the different types of drugs and what could happen. Finally, every single child will have had the experience of peer pressure in some way. Again, as a parent, you talk about this a lot. If, even with that level of instruction and consistent communication, the child ends up taking a pill that someone gave them, it is still your child’s fault. By 14, it is ridiculous to believe and stupid to want for the adults to manage every student conversation anc interaction that occurs in the hallways between classes.

We need to stop letting our kids off with believing someone else has the responsibility to keep them from ever making a poor choice and/or take the responsibility and put it on someone else. Maybe we should all remember how much time we had to practice our social skills and try out different versions of ourselves. Remember how we would bicker and then figure it out? Remember when we “little failed” and our parents didn’t bail us out? I certainly don’t want to go back in time, we have made a lot of social progress, but if we don’t start letting our kids deal with the little fails, a bad grade, getting in trouble from a teacher, forgetting their homework, then I have no idea how these kids are going to handle the big stuff. High school is the big stuff, elementary and middle provide thousands of opportunities to mess up, a little, and it will never matter, as long as the child is permitted to feel the big yucky feelings of messing up and figuring out how to fix it.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:What is the logic behind how the stories about these ODs don’t indicate what kind of drugs the kids were taking?

99% of these deaths are caused by fentanyl. The delivery systems differ, so the kids may think they are taking someone's mom's Xanax (but it's actually a pill pressed out of fentanyl and cut with whatever). Or it's in their marijuana or (as the kid in the training pointed out) in a vape.

The logic behind not reporting it is is that nothing about the report would help prevent another death. You can't say "don't take the brown acid" or whatever you're picturing and have that be the end of it. The fentanyl is, at least potentially, in every illicit substance as a delivery system.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:What is the logic behind how the stories about these ODs don’t indicate what kind of drugs the kids were taking?

Student privacy and I assume hippa.

You don’t understand HIPAA

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:What is the logic behind how the stories about these ODs don’t indicate what kind of drugs the kids were taking?

Student privacy and I assume hippa.

You don’t understand HIPAA

I don’t. And?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:It is really dangerous to believe that only “bad” kids are using drugs or even distributing them in school. The data is clear that the fentanyl crisis hits all economic statuses equally. The problem I have been seeing is that we are in an era where everything is someone’s fault. We sue for the most ridiculous reasons. Now, we want yo expect high school teachers to be allowed (and I really don’t think they should be) to sit inside of the bathroom and watch the students? That would inane in elementary school, none the less high school. Quite frankly, kids know that there is a level of privacy in bathrooms because teachers can not simply enter and there are no cameras.

By 14, all children should understand the risks of drugs. They should know what an overdose looks like and they should be very knowledgeable about the different types of drugs and what could happen. Finally, every single child will have had the experience of peer pressure in some way. Again, as a parent, you talk about this a lot. If, even with that level of instruction and consistent communication, the child ends up taking a pill that someone gave them, it is still your child’s fault. By 14, it is ridiculous to believe and stupid to want for the adults to manage every student conversation anc interaction that occurs in the hallways between classes.

We need to stop letting our kids off with believing someone else has the responsibility to keep them from ever making a poor choice and/or take the responsibility and put it on someone else. Maybe we should all remember how much time we had to practice our social skills and try out different versions of ourselves. Remember how we would bicker and then figure it out? Remember when we “little failed” and our parents didn’t bail us out? I certainly don’t want to go back in time, we have made a lot of social progress, but if we don’t start letting our kids deal with the little fails, a bad grade, getting in trouble from a teacher, forgetting their homework, then I have no idea how these kids are going to handle the big stuff. High school is the big stuff, elementary and middle provide thousands of opportunities to mess up, a little, and it will never matter, as long as the child is permitted to feel the big yucky feelings of messing up and figuring out how to fix it.

I told my children about these cases and how it often happens. I remember reading recently of a case where a half dozen people ended up dead after just trying to smoke weed that unknown to them was laced with fentanyl. I think being open and honest about these things may help make them aware of the stakes of these decisions.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:The parents who think it’s MCPS fault for not monitoring their kids every minute at school are the same ones who complain if teachers limit hall passes to one at a time or the school takes the doors off the bathrooms to discourage kids from congregating there.

There's only so much a school can do, and if some students choose to break the law, their bad choices are hardly MCPS' fault. However, I do think regular schools shouldn't have to deal with this sort of thing, and when there are students who are known to have serious issues, they should be isolated from ordinary students and enrolled in a place that can better help with their problems.

Regular schools and ordinary students use drugs too. This is a nationwide issue, which is now trickling down to the schools.

You know that the PP was talking about kids who are actively and repeatedly abusing substances at school vs those who aren't.

Those aren’t the kids ODing

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Another overdose at John F. Kennedy high school. https://mocoshow.com/blog/police-and-rescue-respond-to-student-overdose-at-kennedy-high-school/?fbclid=IwAR2QKr4keXjIe_DgN-WseNEkD4P32F_nFDFHyx4WE1k-RiOQeze2t1W7CkY&fs=e&s=cl

I wonder if these people are getting their pills from the same source, or if there is a connection.

The amount of lockdowns and overdoses this year are alarming. Just this week there have been guns, overdoses at BCC and Kennedy, knives.

If an SRO were in the school, they'd have a better shot at figuring out a supplier.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Another overdose at John F. Kennedy high school. https://mocoshow.com/blog/police-and-rescue-respond-to-student-overdose-at-kennedy-high-school/?fbclid=IwAR2QKr4keXjIe_DgN-WseNEkD4P32F_nFDFHyx4WE1k-RiOQeze2t1W7CkY&fs=e&s=cl

I wonder if these people are getting their pills from the same source, or if there is a connection.

The amount of lockdowns and overdoses this year are alarming. Just this week there have been guns, overdoses at BCC and Kennedy, knives.

If an SRO were in the school, they'd have a better shot at figuring out a supplier.

Omg they aren’t DEA

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Another overdose at John F. Kennedy high school. https://mocoshow.com/blog/police-and-rescue-respond-to-student-overdose-at-kennedy-high-school/?fbclid=IwAR2QKr4keXjIe_DgN-WseNEkD4P32F_nFDFHyx4WE1k-RiOQeze2t1W7CkY&fs=e&s=cl

I wonder if these people are getting their pills from the same source, or if there is a connection.

The amount of lockdowns and overdoses this year are alarming. Just this week there have been guns, overdoses at BCC and Kennedy, knives.

If an SRO were in the school, they'd have a better shot at figuring out a supplier.

Omg they aren’t DEA

But they have a pulse on the community and know what's going on with the kids in the school and the surrounding neighborhoods. Whether you like it or not, the SROs were viewed by majority of students and staff as a valuable resource in the community.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:It is really dangerous to believe that only “bad” kids are using drugs or even distributing them in school. The data is clear that the fentanyl crisis hits all economic statuses equally. The problem I have been seeing is that we are in an era where everything is someone’s fault. We sue for the most ridiculous reasons. Now, we want yo expect high school teachers to be allowed (and I really don’t think they should be) to sit inside of the bathroom and watch the students? That would inane in elementary school, none the less high school. Quite frankly, kids know that there is a level of privacy in bathrooms because teachers can not simply enter and there are no cameras.

By 14, all children should understand the risks of drugs. They should know what an overdose looks like and they should be very knowledgeable about the different types of drugs and what could happen. Finally, every single child will have had the experience of peer pressure in some way. Again, as a parent, you talk about this a lot. If, even with that level of instruction and consistent communication, the child ends up taking a pill that someone gave them, it is still your child’s fault. By 14, it is ridiculous to believe and stupid to want for the adults to manage every student conversation anc interaction that occurs in the hallways between classes.

We need to stop letting our kids off with believing someone else has the responsibility to keep them from ever making a poor choice and/or take the responsibility and put it on someone else. Maybe we should all remember how much time we had to practice our social skills and try out different versions of ourselves. Remember how we would bicker and then figure it out? Remember when we “little failed” and our parents didn’t bail us out? I certainly don’t want to go back in time, we have made a lot of social progress, but if we don’t start letting our kids deal with the little fails, a bad grade, getting in trouble from a teacher, forgetting their homework, then I have no idea how these kids are going to handle the big stuff. High school is the big stuff, elementary and middle provide thousands of opportunities to mess up, a little, and it will never matter, as long as the child is permitted to feel the big yucky feelings of messing up and figuring out how to fix it.

Thank you. This is everything I’ve been thinking while reading these all too common threads. I have talked to my kids about never, ever taking a pill from someone other than their parents. I need to talk more about peer pressure.
I expect the school to be a safe place. But I’m also a realist and a teacher. I know it’s not perfect, the kids know how to capitalize on vulnerabilities and that it is my job to prepare my kids for the world.
My heart goes out to the family of this child; I hope they are ok and that we all talk to our kids tonight…again.