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St. Charles School District 303 administrators addressed drug use in high school bathrooms, reviewed disciplinary policies and detailed preventive measures in place during the Aug. 5 school board meeting.
The conversation came in response to concerns voiced at a July 29 Business Services Committee meeting where school board members heard from a student and parent organization concerned about the use of drugs in their school’s bathrooms.
District 303 parent Jennifer Benjamin and three THRIVE Youth Coalition members spoke during public comment at the start of the July 29 meeting. Ella Mruk, a recent St. Charles East High School graduate and member of THRIVE, told the board that many students are afraid to use the bathrooms because of the drug use and distribution that occurs in them daily.
The THRIVE members said drugs such as marijuana, Adderall, Xanax and cocaine are being used and dealt in District 303 high school bathrooms and asked for increased education, improved awareness and policy changes around drugs in the district.
THRIVE Parenting Project, Inc. is a nonprofit organization in Kane County co-founded by Benjamin and District 303 board member Kate Bell. It supports parents of children with mental, emotional and behavioral issues. The THRIVE Youth Coalition is an initiative started this summer to encourage young people in Kane County to live drug-free.
The Aug. 5 meeting began with a report from Superintendent Paul Gordon. He addressed the recent concerns and introduced administrators who detailed how they handle and work to prevent substance use in district high schools.
“We wanted to make sure that the board, our community and our students know that we take this seriously and have been taking this seriously for a long period of time,” Gordon said.
District 303 Executive Director of Secondary Education Audra Christenson, North High School Principal Shanna Lewis and East High School Principal Jim Richter told the board that issues with substance use in district high schools are handled by administrators and talked about the actions taken to address and prevent them.
Christenson began by acknowledging the reality of the situation.
“We want to acknowledge that substance use is a reality in our community and our schools, as well as nationwide,” Christenson said.
Christenson said each high school has a Student Resource Officer on campus. She said the partnership allows administrators to get education and prevention ideas from the SRO, and the SRO can provide students and families with support outside of the school setting.
District 303 schools adhere to the student discipline procedures approved by the board each spring, which are drafted in accordance with state law, Christenson said. Under those procedures, each student and situation must be reviewed, evaluated and investigated independently from other students and other situations.
Christenson said the discipline procedures require interventions to be implemented into the consequences they have in place for student behaviors, such as sessions with social workers, participation in educational programs relating to whatever the offense was and restorative measures.
Lewis discussed how the schools respond to individual issues with students and Richter laid out the overall procedures, implements and plans put in place for the student body as a whole.
“Student safety is of utmost importance,” Lewis said. “Not only just creating classroom environments where students are safe to learn, but also creating a safer environment in the larger school setting. It always troubles us knowing that students are using.”
Lewis said the response is different for each student suspected of being under the influence or in possession of substances and factors such as previous offenses, the severity of the incident and the type of substance affect how they are handled. She said whatever the circumstances, any student using or in possession of substances poses a safety threat to themselves and others.
“How we look at every situation is: What do we need to do to make sure that this student is safe and what do we need to do to make sure the larger school is safe?” Lewis said.
Lewis said when a student is sent to the dean’s office for substance related issues, administrators partner with the SRO to conduct an investigation and determine the scope of the incident. She said they always start with a phone call home to provide parents or guardians with information.
Lewis said anything that is confiscated from students is handed over to the police department. She applauded the deans at both high schools for their relationships and trust building with the students, which she said leads to many students taking ownership.
“It is amazing to me how many students really do end up taking ownership or admitting, especially if we have a student who appears to be under the influence but isn’t necessarily in possession,” Lewis said. “Which I attribute to the school community and our staff creating safe places for our students.”
Lewis said the next step is support and education programs such as meeting with counselors and social workers in order to support the student and monitor their progress. She said they also try to connect families with community services for support.
Lewis said in terms of consequences for students caught with substances, they try to keep the students in school where they can be monitored and supported and students are only removed from the building when there are significant safety issues.
Richter said they have several proactive procedures in place to protect the school, such as monthly K-9 searches by the police department’s drug sniffing dogs, changing supervision patterns based on reports from students and parents and sectioning the building into zones to improve student monitoring and support.
When K-9s are brought in, students are kept in classrooms while hallways, lockers, bathrooms, locker rooms and the parking lot are searched by the dogs.
“[The police] partnership has been extremely beneficial to us because in addition to anything that does get found, it also sends a clear message that these are things that do not belong in our school,” Richter said.
Lewis said they will be implementing a new procedure this school year that will allow students to anonymously report safety issues such as bullying and substance use. There will be signs with QR codes in halls and bathrooms that will direct students to the new anonymous report form.
Board member Thomas Lantz asked administrators about what roadblocks they face or tools that might help them when dealing with the substance problem.
Lewis said strengthening relationships with families and increasing parents’ awareness of what their kids are doing would be beneficial. Richter said administrators make sure to follow up on every concern and encouraged school board members to make the schools aware of any issues they hear.
Board member Heidi Fairgrieve asked how the bathrooms are being monitored.
Lewis said the deans or deans’ assistants routinely are going through and checking the bathrooms during every period and passing period. Both she and Richter said they also routinely make bathroom checks when they are in the halls.