Health and Wellness Reports and Program Responses (45 minutes)

Transcript (~1 h 24 min @ 22:20)

Speakers identified by voice; unnamed voices are numbered within this recording. Auto-caption text — verify against the video.

▶ 22:25 Jessica Dugan: Subcommittee. Ms. Dugan. Good evening. We have three items on the EP&P agenda this evening. First up is the health and wellness reports and program responses. So I welcome Superintendent Tamar to introduce and welcome

▶ 22:41 Speaker 1: folks forward. Thank you. I'm going to ask Mr. Fogarty and Ms. White-Lambright to come forward please so this is this is a great opportunity for us as you know the Middlesex League this was probably the second project we took on as a league the first being late start we decided that we needed a better way to not only administer the youth risk behavior survey but to analyze the data what members of our school Wellness Advisory Council will tell you is they've had some frustration over the years with the analysis because depending on who you hired was how good your analysis could it could not be so by joining forces and getting a grant from Leahy Hospital and using them as a partner the district the Middlesex League districts were able to have a computerized version of the test created and then John Snow Inc JSI a reputable health data analysis company has done the analysis for us for the first time the other thing that it does for us it enables us to compare ourselves to the other middle sex league communities rather than just the state so as we all know we have two frequent fields of comparison we're either compared to same communities or middle sex league communities so this enabled us to work together to say since we're already being compared let's do it the right way with with somebody who uses the data and can make that analysis for us the purpose here tonight is to give you an overview of it my obligation is to present the data to you before we make it public as we all know that is my obligation as a superintendent after we present it to you we will do what we need to but to give you an overview and to talk about how it impacts our programming and how it impacts our our partners so we have with us I believe substance abuse counselors with

▶ 25:04 Speaker 1: us our tobacco we call you council morning with a program coordinator our pediatrician dr. wolf is here and who am i missing Jessica Jessica's here dr. and they will all be contributing to this conversation about what the data tells us and what we need to think about his next steps so with that I give you mr.

▶ 25:29 Speaker 5: Fogarty and this white lamb right thank you very much on behalf of the school Wellness Advisory Committee I would like to welcome miss Kathy Guevara miss Maureen Busby miss Jessica Hoffman dr. Wolfe and miss Jamie McAllister grant and also miss Patty white lamb right we represent about half of that committee that sits and discusses questions for a couple of years leading up to it this is our Super Bowl we sit down and we hammer away questions at each other and it goes back and forth for a long time so test was administered last spring these are the results and this will drive where we go in the next few years until we can test again so thank you youth risk behavior survey what is it and why do we

▶ 26:18 Speaker 5: administer it back in the 1990s the federal government decided to test certain areas with youth and behaviors dangerous behaviors unintentional injuries in violence mental health alcohol and other drugs tobacco sexual behaviors related to unintended pregnancy and sexually transmitted infections nutrition and physical activity with that said we test every two years okay at the middle school and at the high school level we administer ybs to determine the prevalence of these health behaviors and how they change over time and also how we drive our curriculum at all levels in the in the district so for the first time in the history of the ybs and melrose public schools this was administered electronically which made it a lot easier to gather questions to administer the test to shorten the time shorten the response on you know all the numbers coming back so we look forward to this and we'll talk more about it as we move forward with this one of our major partners of course was um lay health they funded much of what went on here our partners were the middlesex league and within the middlesex league you know it's a much smaller scale than the entire state of massachusetts or the nation as a whole that said it gives us a close look at what's trending in other communities as well as what's going on in melrose so there are a couple schools that did not participate within the middlesex league and that was due to scheduling some had already administered in the fall the test was put together or the survey was put together over the winter and administered in the spring so we really look forward to doing this again in a couple years and have all 12 middlesex league schools to be a part of this consultants john snow huge part of the data analysis and again the school wellness committee we look forward to digestion of this over the

▶ 28:25 Speaker 5: next couple years all right as we said this was administered last spring grade 7 through 12 648 high schoolers 715 middle schoolers hard copies were made available to all parents in the community parents had the option to you know keep their student from not taking the survey and again it was given electronically for the first time at the high school level is given during English classes and at the middle school it was in this

▶ 28:57 Speaker 2: social studies class all right so another click there is a lot of

▶ 29:03 Speaker 2: information in the YRBS so our efforts here are to give you an overview of some the pieces so this first piece I chose it texted or emailed while driving in high school give you the information compared to how Melrose responded the Middlesex League and then comparison to state and federal in this particular slide I don't have comparison data so some of the questions are different than had been asked two years ago or maybe four years ago when we had that comparison data I've tried to present that to you as we go along but really thinking of this as an opportunity for several reasons this piece where we've been able to take a look as a Middlesex League look at the YR BS and come up with really not it's the standard form of the wire bs that's developed at the federal level but there are some individual questions that we as a group decided to continue to include for instance for us one of the questions we wanted to still look at was around dating violence That's not a question that's part of the standard YRBS but has been an important piece of data collection for us as we've applied for grants in those areas. So this particular question was actually not part of the YRBS but is now part of the YRBS. So I'm really looking at this as an opportunity for us to develop a new baseline and having this standard procedure moving forward over the next two years to give us some good information about trends.

▶ 31:09 Speaker 2: So electronically bullied. So in this slide, we do have comparison data. So when that's available, I did give that to you. looking at Melrose High School in 2015 it was fifteen point seven percent students reporting electronic bullying and this year it's pretty similar fifteen point four percent at the middle school 2015 eighteen point three percent and that's up a bit to nineteen point six percent so that is certainly something that I continue to hear I know it's something administrators we deal with on a routine basis the piece that goes on through student cell phones outside of school continues to be an issue that we address on a routine basis okay so under

▶ 32:13 Speaker 2: that big category of unintentional injuries and violence drove when they

▶ 32:25 Speaker 2: had been drinking alcohol in the past 30 days 6.2 percent of Melrose high school students and that's an increase from 4.1 in 2015 drove with someone who had been

▶ 32:39 Speaker 2: drinking alcohol again an increase in 15 it was 9% up to 12.2 percent drove when they had been using marijuana in the past 30 days 15 7.7 up 12.6 carried a

▶ 32:57 Speaker 2: weapon on school property so this is an example of how the questions has changed a little bit so the previous question was asked in the past 12 months the new question is asked on school property in the past 30 days so again there's some you know correlations you can look at but they're not the exact same question so in 15 it was 5.1 and this time it was 2% and again this is the question a

▶ 33:33 Speaker 2: little bit different experience physical dating violence this year was Melrose 3% in 2015 they had qualified that question on a date or by a date okay so So now it's just a little bit broader of a question. And in 2015, it was 5.5. So I was pleased to see that there was a little bit of a drop in that.

▶ 34:09 Speaker 2: I think certainly an area that we're always concerned about is the mental health of our students. So the idea of feeling sad and not even that specific sad, sad, but the hopelessness I think is an important question to look at. Looking at Melrose, 22.4% in 2015 was 24.2, so there's a slight decrease, but then still, you know, over 20% of our students identifying themselves as feeling sad or hopeless.

▶ 34:51 Speaker 2: this is a question we didn't have data for but I thought was an interesting piece because we we often ties into some of the conversations we've had around late starts or student student stress thinking about those different kind of components so which of the following do you find causes the most negative stress

▶ 35:20 Speaker 2: for you busy schedule 20% of our students parent family demands 16.1% school demands assignments homework it's the biggest piece 36.4% stress in getting through you know all of those requirements social pressures from friends only 3.5% and I and I thought that from my lens was a little interesting where we had had that question around the social bullying piece the electronic bullying that that was you know a higher piece but I think from a student's lens the social interaction that's a release for them that's not a stress that's that's a release from the rest of their day so again you know in these areas where we're pretty comparable to the Middlesex League in those areas but I think it is again something we have to important for us to be aware of and think of as we're putting together what

▶ 36:40 Speaker 2: our expectations and their demands are on students like certainly something of concern your concern is thinking about mental health and if students are considering suicide and in fact have a plan of how they would attempt suicide middle school data is the same from 15 to this year 8.2 percent Melrose high school in 15 it was 9.2 a slight decrease to 8.6 certainly in the area that we have focused on provided training for staff the middle school and high school around sos um so it's it's something that is on our radar and that we have been

▶ 37:48 Speaker 5: actively addressing the next piece is on ever trying a cigarette for the high school students at melrose you know 14 which is pretty consistent with the middlesex league

▶ 38:03 Speaker 5: much lower than the state national averages the next one you know ever used electronic vapor products obviously we've seen a sharp increase here up 12 since the last round of testing and you know some of the students claims i hear whether it's at the playground or um you know in the hallways or after school when you hear kids talk about it you know some of them feel it's a safe alternative to cigarette smoking and obviously we have to do a better job at educating them about health consequences but this is where we saw a sharp increase tobacco use at the high

▶ 38:44 Speaker 5: school 14 reported that they have tried the cigarette smoking and 5.2 percent current smokers

▶ 38:57 Speaker 5: with 1.2 percent smoke cigarettes frequently um all that said you know the smoking we were beyond that it's just such a small population that was ever doing it and um now with the vapor products it's it's it's a new fight and we have to uh gear up and be ready for that the use of tobacco at the

▶ 39:18 Speaker 5: middle school we fared better than than most schools in the local communities and um you know cigarette smoking for the for the youth is is down at this point in time

▶ 39:31 Speaker 1: i think i guess i'm a little bit amazed by the cigarette smoking i know the vaping and i know maureen's going to speak to it eventually um tonight but i never see kids with cigarettes i never see butts on the ground so i'm surprised that so it must be off campus but it seems higher

▶ 39:53 Speaker 5: to you than you would think yeah what yeah you certainly don't see it in public anywhere it's out of the restaurants it's out of the workplaces i mean it's it's tougher to to do that and i i'm guessing i'm thinking some of these kids if you go home smelling like cigarettes parents know something was up go home after vaping they may not have a scent to that at all and um you know a little sleight of hand and kids trying something new electronic vaping products use at the high

▶ 40:27 Speaker 5: school a larger proportion of high school students in melrose reported ever using electronic vapor products up to 36% which the two years ago is a 24% 36 holds consistent with the league but it's far higher than we'd like to see proportion of Melrose students were reported that they currently use vapor products that's it about almost 30% and almost 20% than the rest of the Middlesex League It's something that we need to address as educators as a whole, and we had a professional development a couple weeks ago, and it was not on vaping, but we had a very robust conversation about what we can do, and it started with the middle school teachers, and then you could hear the elementary people trickling off on what they could do better, and then, of course, the high school people, oh, no, that's not true. this is what i heard so unintentional but it's a direct product of a simple conversation with someone dropping a stat about what's going on and it was a great conversation we look forward to having more of that and talking with miss busby and some of the potential program that we could do and use some of our resources to address this concern the electronic vaping is trending upwards

▶ 41:56 Speaker 5: at the middle school unfortunately as you can see this 2017 14 excuse me four point seven percent and just two years earlier it was point eight percent so it is getting to the younger kids I think it's become a more commonplace and it

▶ 42:26 Speaker 2: needs to be addressed as I stated so Kathy was kind enough to help me put some of this information together so thinking about what's our drug use what are kids doing at the high school and also in the middle school so ever use marijuana Melrose 34.8% it's a hot high number higher than any of us would like to see and interesting again this specific question was asked a different way in previous years so it's interesting just how they change some of those components so here's we have lots of information here regarding marijuana use and other drug use and I think the pieces although maybe many people had tried it that people who identified themselves as current users is a bit lower still over 20% of the high school students and that you know there are

▶ 43:45 Speaker 2: also students experimenting at the middle school as well a much lower number so the middle school kids are not that active but there is some starting around almost 4% of kids and so then but then there's a huge increase into the high school so really what's happening Kathy has been an integral part of working and meeting with guidance counselors working with our high school students and providing support to the staff around this issue looking at

▶ 44:36 Speaker 2: alcohol use at the middle school Melrose in 2015 11% up to 15.1% I think you can see that there's an overall trend that alcohol use in particular is not going in the direction that we would like to see it is increasing across the board in

▶ 45:10 Speaker 2: all areas alcohol use at Melrose High School 62.5% reported that they had ever a drink which is a little higher 61% in 2015 again I think the more concerning piece is that people who say they're currently drink one or more times in the last month 41% of students and that's up from 34% in 2015 so again I think overall when you're looking at the alcohol piece there is a trend not in

▶ 45:47 Speaker 2: the direction that we would like to see there was just I'll just there was just an article about binge drinking you know maybe some of you had seen but again engaging in the binge drinking which has even more serious consequences twenty six point eight percent reported that they've engaged in that kind of behavior

▶ 46:12 Speaker 2: which is up from 18% in 2015 so again an area that we need to have some of our

▶ 46:20 Speaker 2: efforts in and part of I think the takeaway from the YRBS is that these risky behaviors it's not things that are just done in isolation but these risky behaviors then impact decision-making and other types of activities and they're the underpinning of them making other poor types of decisions regret what they had done got into trouble had unintended sex so the this behavior is not in isolation it's connected with other dangerous choices where do they

▶ 47:05 Speaker 2: get alcohol home friends house park party others so it's not this is it's

▶ 47:15 Speaker 2: not just a school issue this is a community issue that we need to be talking about and thinking about how we can address this in a proactive manner

▶ 47:33 Speaker 2: one of the questions have at the high school have you engaged in sexual intercourse this is one area that has gone down on 2015 32.3 percent of students reported that they had and now we're looking at a little under 25% which I think in some ways that's you know you're saying then 75% of students report that they have not and kind of that idea sometimes that kids do feel like everybody oh everybody's doing something well actually 75% of students

▶ 48:12 Speaker 2: are not so those are also good information and messages to get out

▶ 48:19 Speaker 5: nutrition and physical activity I would like to think Melrose a very healthy community this people out exercising at all times morning boot camps running at night Melrose Running Club Melrose Recreation Department they can give you stats youth soccer doesn't matter we have a ton of kids that are highly active with that it's great to say Melrose students are more likely to eat breakfast every day we all know how important that can be Melrose students are more likely to exercise every day and Melrose students are more likely to consider themselves fit when they view themselves so these are all great qualities and you know hopefully it offsets some of some of the negative

▶ 49:05 Speaker 5: that we shared with you today conclusions this is a great opportunity to compare ourselves with the Middlesex League I know we've done it with Massachusetts as a whole but to look at these local communities you know some very similar to us some may be a little bit different we could argue that all night long but the fact that these are real people with with real data and we have access to that and we can look at the program that's offset some of these what's going on in arlington what's going on at wakefield so with this shared data comes shared resources and we really look forward to uh seeing where that leads some major concerns

▶ 49:43 Speaker 5: the uh the increased use of electronic vapor products and the alcohol use as miss patty white lambright said the alcohol use i mean that is a compute community issue that you know it's going to take all of us to to address the electronic vacant vaping relatively new to the scene and you know we're open to suggestions it's important to view

▶ 50:07 Speaker 5: the use of alcohol and drugs is impacting on other risky behaviors what happens when the students are under the influence and the decision-making skills how they diminish so quickly so I that's certainly something to consider so positive trends in decreases related to dating violence in engaging in sexual intercourse. That's a good thing. Many areas are similar to the Middlesex League and lower in relation to the state and federal results. I mean, we're not satisfied with that, obviously, but it's who we are, it's where we are, and it gives us a direction of where we need to go and areas we can make improvement. So partnering with the Middlesex League schools gives us a new baseline, you know, to move forward, to look at these local trends. It's not just it is going on it's not an excuse but we need to deal with it it's very exciting to work with these other districts to solve some of these problems to share the resources and to address the concerns that were identified through this test so it's an exciting time to say the least the next steps over the

▶ 51:14 Speaker 5: next year Melrose will work with the school districts in the Middlesex League to analyze the YRBS more thoroughly we'll identify some common trends consider the opportunities for shared professional development and resources develop plans to ensure broader participation in the 2019 YRVS process. Our wellness department will analyze the data to ensure the curriculum is supporting the needs of our students and just through that impromptu conversation they came up with a few quick wins that you know can be addressed and we're looking forward to looking more deeply at some of these trending issues. We'll

▶ 51:51 Speaker 5: continue our relationships with the partner resources within the local and regional community to name a few tomorrow substance abuse abuse prevention coalition mystic valley tobacco alcohol prevention program mass in motion morrow's alliance against violence in the middle six partnership for youth so those are some organizations we've been working with for years and we continue to work together to solve some of these challenging problems that we're faced with so we welcome any comments or

▶ 52:23 Speaker 2: questions and our colleagues on the School Wellness Advisory Council would be happy to join and answer questions as well thank you so much this is an

▶ 52:35 Jessica Dugan: amazing amount of information I know the committee is eager to dive in with some conversations with you all so thank you for being here point of clarification before that with the administration of the survey in comparison between us and other districts or across years is there a statistical significance a point at which it's sick it's what am I trying to say how many points difference represents a significant change either way in compare not in comparison this

▶ 53:06 Speaker 2: our first time comparing ourselves to the middle six yeah no in it in any you

▶ 53:16 Speaker 1: know I'm trying to say you mean in terms of a statistically statistically becomes significant whether it's up or down probably a five a five point range so

▶ 53:25 Jessica Dugan: there were a lot that were very very close statistically relatively insignificant although all important to recognize I was just wondering from an administration point what that was thanks so much so just a background and

▶ 53:37 Speaker 1: I really want to give a chance to our partners to speak to the work they're doing with us one of the interesting challenges here was getting 12 districts to decide on the questions the CDC questions were pretty set but everybody uses these this data for grants in their own community so like we're the only only community that adds dating violence other districts at wanted other questions and we were struggling not to have this grow to be a monster and take two kids two hours and I have to tell you having Leahy and John Snow really made it a much more worthwhile process because they helped guide us and they would say no through this data you could capture this through this data you capture that so that was a very important learning process for the communities involved the the other thing is when you were trying to get twelve people on the same page and imagine twelve superintendents trying to get on the same page as Patti said some of the questions were worded differently this year you know when I first saw the gun violence one I was like a little crazed and I'm and I'm calling in Brent and Jason say saying and they're going time out time out all right this is nobody carrying a gun in the buildings please get and stop getting nervous and they said you know the thing that that the question doesn't gather because it says have you be is a lot of our kids come from hunting families and it doesn't gather exposure to guns it only it narrowed it to did you carry a weapon on campus so it doesn't talk about the exposure to weapons which to me is a very significant number because not only because of the society we live in but when we can when we concern about kids rash behaviors when they're under the influence you know my concern is what weapons are in homes we have no way of capturing that we have no way of

▶ 55:58 Speaker 1: of capturing who if they're driving with somebody under the influence is it an adult or another kid there was no way to capture that so while there's a lot of important information here you have to take it in the context that there's also pieces of information that are missing and we need to adjust to be able to address what we can in schools but where our partners take it in the community is is just as important um the um the drinking when you look at the drinking how many of them got

▶ 56:36 Speaker 1: alcohol at home all right um i don't know how as school district we address that um so while it gives us good data there's a lot of holes that have to be filled as well

▶ 56:49 Speaker 1: So before anybody gets alarmed like I got alarmed, let's, you know, ask good questions of Maureen, Kathy, Jessica, Alan, and see what they can provide us.

▶ 57:02 Jessica Dugan: As with all data, it highlights places where you want to look deeper. So with that, I welcome discussion, questions from the committee. Ms. Cassatelli.

▶ 57:14 Christine Casatelli: Thank you for your presentation tonight. how long has this survey been conducted in our district I look to my fellow

▶ 57:23 Speaker 2: historians I mean it was developed in 1990 I do not know I was not here believe it or not I'm not sure if we went right with the first administration

▶ 57:48 Speaker 1: or not so they used to be a grant incentive to do it and like all grant incentives then it went away with the assumption that we would assume cost I think that we've done it every two years I don't I don't ever believe there's been a blip I don't think we've ever missed it yeah but I think that's also been a factor in the quality of the data that we've gathered depending on how much we could pay an agency to do the data analysis and that's why we were all attracted to the fact that if we could do this as a group we could pay better I

▶ 58:24 Christine Casatelli: guess I'm less interested in what Arlington or Wakefield is doing than I am in seeing our progress over the years so if we were to have longitudinal data and I know the questions change somewhat but just questions on drinking smoking I want to see our progress over the long term are we making the progress and as a budget making body that we are I would love to see on that line an overlay of where we initiated programs so that we could see if they were successful or not I think that is the true value of this data. I mean in terms of the data from other school districts maybe if Arlington has just a really low percentage of using of smoking then maybe we could share best practices with them but as a community we need to see how successful we are over the past decade in helping our kids to be healthier so if I could encourage you at some later date to share that data with us I think especially as we get closer to the budget process I think that would be that that would be incredibly

▶ 59:54 Speaker 2: valuable thank you sure and you know there are certainly some trends like with the tobacco use that's definitely been a decrease but even when we look back to say three wire bs before the question around um vaping that wasn't even there right

▶ 1:00:17 Speaker 2: but certainly tobacco over 10 years overall decrease and but unfortunately any decreases that we've made have only been absorbed and in surpassed in vaping use so it's like one of those things you think you're going in the right direction and then this entire industry and this entire way of looking and I think again lot you know the drinking component has been steadily going in the wrong direction right well

▶ 1:00:51 Christine Casatelli: and that's valuable information so if our if the cigarette use is going down and then at some point then we like then we have to see where did vaping start and that's useful information for the committee because now maybe we have to beef up our programs with more information about that so again the long longitudinal data I think would be even more valuable than this some

▶ 1:01:24 Speaker 1: middle-sex data so and and I would invite Maureen Busby to speak to it but I think Stephen made an important point and it has to go into understanding kids

▶ 1:01:37 Speaker 1: and who they are kids may not have tried smoking because that's easy to get

▶ 1:01:45 Speaker 1: caught at the vaping appears to be and I'm just saying appears to some kids to be a safe risk if I'm going to engage in risky behavior this is a safe risk it's electronic it doesn't smell or I can make it smell like peppermint you know it doesn't cost ten dollars a day for a pack I don't know how much it costs you know but I invite Maureen to speak to it

▶ 1:02:20 Speaker 3: Okay.

▶ 1:02:21 Jessica Dugan: Thank you. The two side mics are open as well, if anybody else wants to join. Either way is fine.

▶ 1:02:25 Speaker 1: Yeah.

▶ 1:02:28 Speaker 1: So a couple of important differences, I think, between smoking and vaping. One is every child, say nothing about every adult, knows smoking is bad for you. So your point is a good one that people think it's safer. Also the local governments, state governments, federal governments have done a lot of not just prevention but also regulations around tobacco advertising around flavors of cigarettes not other tobacco products but cigarettes cartoon using cartoon advertising those things are not legal however there aren't those regulations around vaping so we see celebrities on TV using vaping products where we don't see them smoking at an awards show for instance and in some communities vaping is legal to do the activity is legal to do where smoking is not and I can't tell you how many it's not just students saying well it's just water vapor and it's it's safe right but many many adults vaping is so new to us that we just don't have the education around vaping that we had it took us decades to get everybody right educated around the dangers of smoking I hope it doesn't take us decades to get educated around the the dangers of vaping vaping for people who don't know most vape products include nicotine nicotine is the most highly addictive substance in a cigarette if our students are vaping in the schools home parks or wherever wherever they are a lot of them are probably addicted to nicotine and unfortunately it's a very very tough addiction so I'm happy to that we have this data and I'm very pleased with you know the school administrators who have said we're gonna work on this and you know what can we do and try to identify some programs and to Chris's point we don't have longitudinal data on this yet but we have we have years of smoking but we have a snapshot in time right now of some pretty I think startling numbers and we don't even have to wait for that to work on on vaping smoking has gone down drastically not that we don't have to worry about it there are there are kids who still do smoke and we certainly want to keep up that prevention effort that tobacco is bad but clearly many fewer kids are using tobacco than using vaping and we've got to figure out what messages to use I had a great discussion with the new 84 club at the it's a anti-tobacco program after-school program with some of the students there and we talked about what messages would get to students because most of us adults aren't very good at figuring out what messages will will speak to the students but students are better at that so I'm glad that we have some youth involvement in this because I think it's very very important it is also interesting to know some of the data from some of the other communities while we're most concerned about Melrose of course it's interesting I work in a couple of more urban communities may be less affluent and their vaping rates are significantly lower than the more affluent communities that we see on this chart today so understanding why that is you know might be one of the things that that's important to us I know I've heard from I received a lot of vape products that have been confiscated by school resource officers or others in the schools but some I haven't received because they say the parents come to the schools and want them back because they're so expensive and maybe the parents paid for them it'll be important for us to know where the students are getting these these products we have very very good tobacco slash nicotine so that covers vaping products regulations in Melrose you have to be 21 to buy tobacco or nicotine products we have a flavor restrictions you can't buy all those flavored products that that these the tobacco industry uses to attract kids to them can't buy those in a in Melrose stores so we've done a really good job with our regulations but where are the kids getting these products a lot of them they're getting online if you have an Amazon gift card and you go online to a site where you can order a vape product it says are you 18 you click yes and you get it you don't have to prove you're 18 and it and that's all you have to be you don't have to be 21 on online you have to be 21 to purchase in in Melrose so we we we certainly have a lot to learn but we really have a lot of education to do with our educators with our coaches and I think especially with our parents and so I appreciate the opportunity to be here tonight and you know look forward to working with all of on how to you know slow down this this attractive attraction to and use of

▶ 1:07:37 Christine Casatelli: vaping products I just have one more question where are the questions or the responses on prescription medication and opioid use there's one on marijuana use

▶ 1:07:49 Speaker 2: and other drug use yeah that there's a bullet there it was with respect to all of the forms of drug use the percentage of Melrose high school students who ever used cocaine heroin methamphetamines ecstasy and prescription drugs was 5.4

▶ 1:08:14 Christine Casatelli: percent and I and I I appreciate that slide I'm I guess I'm interested in more detail like I'm worried about well prescription drug use and I mean we have an opioid crisis and I'm wondering what's the impact of that and Melrose

▶ 1:08:33 Speaker 1: with our kids I mean I think that the data that we did get were very low which

▶ 1:08:42 Speaker 2: is still concerning because that says that kids have access at some capacity that we need to be concerned about I think as a state we've done a very nice

▶ 1:08:54 Speaker 1: job with prescription drugs and monitoring in a lot of capacities

▶ 1:08:57 Speaker 2: obviously it's still an issue and it's something that we want to pay attention to but it's not as significant as it was like ten years ago okay thank you so in

▶ 1:09:07 Christine Casatelli: future surveys I guess I would like to see even more data and we might get more

▶ 1:09:14 Speaker 2: data as it comes I think this is like a preliminary report right and we're getting more data to come back from what we received at least what I got on the email right with each question breaking it down I think she sent the

▶ 1:09:31 Speaker 1: supplemental report last month yeah I asked them for a supplemental report and they sent it last month so you should have had it okay I'll check my emails

▶ 1:09:45 Margaret Raymond Driscoll: okay thank you mr. school thanks appreciate all your collective efforts on this one question for a miss Busby the chewing tobacco we used to talk about chewing tobacco do you have a sense of whether that's up or down or whether it's really all absorbed by vaping I did I miss that in here yeah I

▶ 1:10:02 Speaker 1: don't did we I don't know if we had that as a separate smokeless okay so that is at 3% okay thanks yeah okay typically chewing tobacco is used by our student athletes and that has remained pretty steady over the years statewide at least it remains about 20% of our student athletes use chewing tobacco and it it isn't restricted to them but that's the population that generally uses it so it's really important to get that message to coaches and people who work with our student athletes so in our in our coach training is that an element of the of the training for all of our coaches and if it's not I'm hoping it

▶ 1:10:47 Speaker 5: obviously drugs alcohol tobacco are talked about but you know more of an emphasis on on many of these topics needs to be made thank you appreciate

▶ 1:10:54 Margaret Raymond Driscoll: that and I also wondered when you look at the the number of students who are surveyed for example you said 648 high school students so we have over 900 students at the high school so I realized that some could opt out so can you just give us a sense of why that number is not 300 did not opt out the

▶ 1:11:16 Speaker 5: timing of the survey came out late spring and many of our seniors were on internships and therefore we didn't capture all of our senior information so

▶ 1:11:30 Margaret Raymond Driscoll: potentially your your high school data is that could be a little bit skewed to grades 9 10 and 11 right okay so I I think that's kind of important for us to think about in terms of what might have been without making judgments but so hopefully next year or in two years whatever it is when it's I'm sure you'll take that into no I've already taken into consideration because again by the time we got the grant finished writing the yeah revised and we wanted to do at least one round and get a baseline so we've agreed as a league that we will do it in the fall of 19 okay so and I think it's important once you present that information to just sort of point that out when the data is collected because if you see a rise in behaviors that might be considered more adult in nature you may see skewing there so and I just wanted to say thank you for all of your efforts and to remind the community that this is Melrose Public Schools this is not every child every student in the city of Melrose and I'm glad that you've pointed out this is a societal problem this is a community problem or challenge really to help our our children and our students engage in and smart and healthy behaviors and I also really appreciate the fact that there is discussion around how with certain substances parents play a significant role and if parents are buying the substances that's a problem and I think it's important for us as a community to admit and to say that's not okay it's not okay so as parents I hope we ask our children where are you going who will be there what will you be doing and then if there are issues kind of circling back and asking the questions and that's really really hard to do but I appreciate the fact that we're recognizing that these behaviors have a variety of causes or sources and sometimes kids do stupid things and so it's our job to help them do fewer

▶ 1:13:49 Speaker 2: stupid things so thank you I'd just like to mention at Parent University I had a table and I had some vaping stuff there and one of the number one questions was about vaping and parents asking is there really nicotine they really have no idea what are in these products well I had one mom she bought it for her child you know because the child said you know oh mom it doesn't have nicotine did it and parents don't necessarily always research it they look to the pet you know they look to the kid for the information and think they know the latest trends and things like that well this particular child recently had to be hospitalized for about a week and a half and had to ask for a nicotine patch and it made the parent really say geez I really didn't know there was that much nicotine that you know this person would be that uncomfortable so I mean it just demonstrates how much we really need to educate parents about what are in these

▶ 1:14:46 Speaker 1: products and how much parents want to be and they want to be educated and Maureen

▶ 1:14:50 Speaker 2: and I have discussed it and we you know we have some things down the road and along with the schools about you know how to proceed but we'll get them for

▶ 1:15:03 Speaker 2: their questions miss McAllister grant thank you all so much I've enjoyed working with you and I'm wondering if you could speak to if you have a sense of which programs have been effective at the high school level regarding drug use and alcohol use do you have a read on which ones are having more of an impact

▶ 1:15:30 Speaker 2: in terms of what you've been implementing like for instance one of ours I think there's also some caution when you say like program it's not necessarily that we buy some type of kit that some kind of separate piece all right I think the effective way to deal with all of these issues is to again to think about things in a global manner about how we addressing them through all aspects of our curriculum this is not just something that we Stephen has to address in wellness these these are pieces we have to address across curriculum but also in practices for instance one of the pieces we had instituted at the high school is called critical case management where the

▶ 1:16:28 Speaker 2: guidance staff and administrators meet together to talk about students who we have concerns of and they're not necessarily students who have already been identified as special ed there are a wide range of kids and how are we going to support those kids and what are the issues and then being able to through that type of meeting say Kathy we have somebody we really would like for you to talk with and support so having that kind of resource having those kind of discussions I think those are the kind of efforts that help to turn these behaviors and start to address some of the issues I think our increase in support even you know we have increased our psychologists support at the high school the availability of counseling I think those are actions that will help

▶ 1:17:38 Speaker 2: to support these efforts I also think the you know we have a youth action team that we have you know it's we had one we had to re-implement it you know when I started I hired Bob Severino and he's been very helpful with me you know we're doing you know and it's things it's consistency it's not just one program it's doing things throughout the year so you know we had red ribbon week we you know try to make our youth come to even like in plain sight that was for adults but have youth be at the tables and be involved having youth talk to youth is you know very helpful you know we're training them to go into the classes you know into the health classes and talk about these things I just started the junior high youth action team so it's going to be myself and the SRO officer Higgins so we're having our second meeting tomorrow we had 35 to 40 you know middle school youth that were interested in you know doing something like this and it's a it is a program or something like that you know if we can get them in middle school and carry off they can do it all the way through high school and it gives them the skills that they need you know they learn about you know the substances but they also learn how to you know take notes and do agendas and so it gives them some leadership skills too so i think it's just consistently you know doing things like that you know um in january we're probably going to have this theater group called improbable players that we've booked to come and they have like a theater group you know for the kids um this will be at the junior high you know so just having things like that that and make ourselves visible to the youth and to the administrative in the community like like going to parent university or the holiday thing and just keep being visible. Thank you. And the MVP course, has that been, do you have a sense of how successful that's been, if it will continue? Yeah, I can tell you that. So this is our second year offering the MVP, Mentors in Violence Prevention. If you recall, that had come out of our work through the STEP grant. So it was initially a grant funded piece and we looked to how can we sustain that work and we were able to make that a course offering. The first year we did not have the numbers we would have liked to have seen. The numbers have absolutely grown in the second year in participation as an elective through the wellness department.

▶ 1:20:19 Speaker 5: Yes, on top of that though, so many kids did take it that second year that the third year yeah it's there aren't as many elective offerings right now with the way that the scheduling is being done which is a different topic but there's certainly a lot of interest with the students and so much so you know the club has grown outside of the school as well so not only was it a class or course offering during the school day but kids are volunteering electing to partake in a very similar structure outside of school thank you

▶ 1:20:56 Speaker 2: very much I just want to introduce Liz Parsons who sorry if she's taking some one she does the regional substance abuse for alcohol so I don't know if she had anything to add because I know you're doing you know something with

▶ 1:21:09 Speaker 1: parents and you know working towards that so I know she's doing good things

▶ 1:21:22 Speaker 2: things because she's Holy Cross class of 2000 whereas I am Holy Cross class of

▶ 1:21:31 Speaker 2: 99 thank you I was just coming actually to support my colleagues and Maureen invited me but yeah I work for the city of Melrose as a regional substance abuse prevention coordinator so I work with some of the towns that were involved in this assessment and part of what we did was an assessment across the six cities and towns and learned several things and one what Kathy mentioned is that parents in general have a favorable out favorable attitude towards underage drinking so they either accept or think that it's a rite of passage all the kids are going to do it and Melrose is not alone in this this was what we saw across the region and also related to that was what you mentioned talked about consequences and setting rules and consequences for behavior before it actually happens was a key piece because a lot of parents say well I haven't thought about that yet I'll you know wait to see if when it happens or if it happens then we'll set the consequences so that was a big gap and the second piece was on the local level so we we saw a need to sort of educate bring awareness around how local alcohol policies can affect underage drinking rates so in these aren't policies that necessarily not like you know a police enforcing social host liability or something like that but also local policies related to excessive adult use in role modeling again parent role role modeling but also just community adults and role modeling and any policies or or local laws that could affect excessive adult use. So that could be how many alcohol outlets there are in a community or in one space. That could be enforcement. All of this has an enforcement piece, whether or not a law or a school policy or a local policy is enforced. And the third piece was around supporting schools. So a lot of schools didn't have substance use policies. and if they had them they weren't enforced, they weren't employed, they weren't effective. Melrose, a lot of our colleagues across the region looked to Melrose's policy because it's very well written and the restorative justice sort of approach was an appeal and so to make drug and alcohol use for a student to be more less punitive and more therapeutic so those are the three components and just some general thoughts I had about how to respond to that and this is a phrase that we've used as prevention professionals for a long time is you can't educate your way out of substance use and I think schools kind of really big sigh of relief and they go okay good it's you know not just just our problem but the same time I think a lot of people look to schools because that's where the kids are right so I think it is something it's sort of what our whole you know regional work is addressing parents addressing the local communities and addressing the schools and not just addressing but supporting and finding a way to make a difference at each of those levels and impact the greatest amount of people in the greatest amount of youth is really the goal and I'm speaking tomorrow at the substance abuse coalition meeting more about what we're doing but I'm happy to answer any questions or talk to anyone

▶ 1:25:13 Jessica Dugan: afterwards about the work thank you further questions discussion mr. Selma

▶ 1:25:17 Speaker 3: thank you for this report I found it very enlightening I recall seeing the similar report in 2015 and noticing that there were in fact some differences I tend to agree in that the language and awareness that is around vaping is not as nearly as mature as said language or education around smoking or some of the other vices that our community and indeed the state may have. So that's definitely something for us to plan forward.

▶ 1:26:05 Speaker 3: know so I had trouble to some extent the more I dove into this document the more

▶ 1:26:16 Speaker 3: I realized that while we are talking Melrose and you know missing thanks to one of my colleagues asking the question the bulk of a senior class I find a lot of this data to be well incomplete and instead of making apples to apples comparison to some extent I feel as though we're making apples to oranges tangerines and plum comparisons I'm speaking not just about statistics statistical deviation which was already addressed by the superintendent but also with the idea that if we don't have a full picture in our own high school it's hard to really make a plan moving forward and while a survey a survey over survey comparison between the entire Middlesex League is helpful it's also important to keep in mind that those districts are not of the same size as ours right so there's their statistical deviation is going to be different frankly than ours and it's going to put a little bit of a finer point so perhaps in the future I might request that not only do we add the deviation but we also add more demographics it would help us pinpoint what messages and and how to tailor those messages to our students to our parents indeed to our entire community I don't really have any questions thank you very much I echo many of the same things that we've already heard statistical deviation why

▶ 1:28:09 Speaker 2: didn't you bail the scientist well I know I'm not and I happen to know that

▶ 1:28:11 Speaker 3: we have a stats class at the high school my son's taking it indeed did you have a

▶ 1:28:25 Speaker 1: comment yeah I have a comment well I appreciate the fact that we couldn't capture all the senior class the senior class was leaving us okay and what was

▶ 1:28:33 Speaker 1: important was the kids were staying here that we do have time and I think that's

▶ 1:28:47 Speaker 1: important I will tell you personally I've always had problems with YRBS you

▶ 1:28:52 Speaker 1: talk to educators and they'll talk to you and you talk to the statisticians as well they'll talk to you about reliability validity they'll talk to you about false answers they'll talk to you about you know kids getting out of class and they're going to say oh yeah I answered the sex question because at 17 years old that's an important thing to say and quite honestly I don't know how

▶ 1:29:28 Speaker 1: useful this is all right we do it because we need the data for grants we do it because it's an expectation from the state that we do it I don't know how important the data is I think what is most important is and I think I don't know whether it was Maureen Busby who said it or somebody else who said it we're no different than any other city or town you grow up in America quite

▶ 1:29:52 Speaker 1: frankly you're a drop you're exposed to as we used to say sex drugs and rock and role and it's our job as adults whether teachers or parents to try to steer our kids to good choices to the mental and physical hazards of bad choices regardless of what we did in our youth and I will venture to say there were many people sitting within at home or in this audience who said well I did it and I survived I think the most difficult education piece and again I think Kathy referred to it is parents don't understand how different it is I don't know if I could ever emphasize enough how different it is when you talk about marijuana there is no way somebody in my generation can understand the impact of marijuana of my kids in my classes generation it's so much more potent so

▶ 1:31:00 Speaker 1: much more toxic Chris it Chris Casatelli asked a question about opioids I will venture to say within the sound of my voice there are as many adults at home saying well my doctor prescribed oxy it must have been okay not knowing how kids

▶ 1:31:16 Speaker 1: steal it abuse it sell it on the street I will venture to say there are many

▶ 1:31:23 Speaker 1: people at home that don't understand how Ritalin is so stolen and sold on the street so kids can use it to get high so you can give me all the statistics you

▶ 1:31:36 Speaker 1: want it doesn't get us away from what our job is and what we need to do and I

▶ 1:31:43 Speaker 1: think the real question in the room is and Melrose I have to tell you and I was on the phone today with God knows how I got hooked into this again by MASS they asked me to speak to another researcher and and I was bragging because I was bragging about the fact that Melrose is an unusual city in the fact that I have substance abuse a counselor available to my buildings I have a tobacco coordinator available to my buildings I have a physical health coordinator available to my buildings I have a regional alcohol available to my

▶ 1:32:26 Speaker 1: buildings I want you to hear the phrase I used every time available to my

▶ 1:32:39 Speaker 1: buildings so we're doing everything we can but I have to tell you it's an uphill battle and until there is a community effort you can take all the surveys you want you can do all the longitudinal studies you want you could talk about the nature of the questions as much as you want I have heard this

▶ 1:33:00 Speaker 1: question I have heard this conversation for four decades as an educator all

▶ 1:33:11 Speaker 1: right I could tell you horror stories about kids being arrested on the beach where I raised my kids and the parents going to the police station saying give me back the beer I paid for it give me back the vapor I paid for it I rather have them drink in my house than drink on the street and let me tell you how much the recreational marijuana law is frightening the daylights out of me as an educator so again you can have all the statistics you want the job doesn't change and it's not going to change until the adults decide they have a

▶ 1:33:54 Speaker 1: responsibility here so we can create programs we can address programs we can inundate the kids I will tell you I walk through a health class and I got kids rolling their eyes at me because they've heard this 15 times already and once they lean the leaves the confines of our buildings we do not control it we will

▶ 1:34:13 Speaker 1: continue to do our job we will continue to educate our kids we will continue to make headway but I gotta tell you guys some days I think my kids are more

▶ 1:34:26 Speaker 4: mature than the adults mr. O'Connell thank you very much so let's do something about that because I think you're right madam superintendent there's clearly a consensus that this is a community problem that requires a community response and I think all of you not just tonight in your presentations but always are doing great work in this regard the the school Wellness Advisory Council the substance abuse prevention coalition mr. Fogarty and his staff and others in our schools who are addressing these issues in wellness classes but as has been pointed out tonight and otherwise these are the kinds of problems that end up on our doorstep that end up in our schools but they're really not school problems that said those of us who serve here believe passionately that our schools are very much a pillar of our community so when I and my colleagues see data like this particularly the data with regard to alcohol abuse the question that I think should be foremost is what are we going to do about it what what's our role as a school committee and as a school district to deal with this community problem and I think given the work the terrific work that all of you are doing individually and given the fact that this data I think as the superintendent has pointed out if I may say so charitably reflects a struggle that our families have not just our students but our families in dealing with this that I think particularly with regard to alcohol in this community and I say this as not just a school committee member but as a parent of three young people that I think it's high time that we really come together as a community and have a conversation about this a real substantive conversation that's just not you professionals taking this on one by one not just us talking about it here and looking to our faculty to address this societal problem but us bringing together all of you your constituencies our families and our students in a community way to talk about this and you know part of the problem is and someone touched upon this it's the circling back that we're not good at you know sometimes as parents and as community members we're good on the front end you shouldn't be doing this this isn't healthy this is wrong but when there are transgressions we're not always good about taking corrective action and I say this I think more as a parent than as a member of this committee or as someone associated with the schools we don't always call up the other parents and say what's going on with this like a lot of communities I the one thing that we don't do well is talking about the bad stuff there's a lot of good stuff to talk about thankfully but we need to get better at talking about the bad stuff so I think one thing this committee can do seeing this and I think this speaks to what the superintendent was talking about is taking this on as a community and the school committee partnering with the school wellness Advisory Council partnering with the substance abuse prevention coalition partnering with Miss Parsons and the groups that she's working with partnering with the police department police department is rolling out an innovative and progressive diversion program for juvenile offenses related to alcohol abuse and substance abuse let's let's harness these resources together and I think you know it a lot of the time we get problems here that there's really little we can do about as a school committee or even as a school district this is one that's well within the purview and bailiwick of this committee to help lead a coalition of providers and experts and bringing the community together to talk about these things we don't do that enough I think there's a real opportunity here and I for one will work with my colleagues old and new to take this on I think this is something we can bring a lot of attention to and and let's do it proactively right we we we haven't had you know a disaster there have been disasters in other communities and then people swing it to action let's do it proactively let's build on all the expertise we have let's build on these resources let's leverage them together and take this on as a community it's not a school problem it's a community problem and I for one and I know many of my colleagues are ready to step up in this regard to help lead this so thank you very much just add two things first

▶ 1:40:10 Jessica Dugan: I do think actually one thing the the statistics the data may not be new to you to other people who are in this work daily I do think they are attention getting to parents especially parents of students on the younger side of taking this survey so the superintendent opened by saying she had a responsibility to share this with us first and I think it's really important and the answer may not be in the room tonight but as mr. O'Connell said we appreciate tremendously our collaboration with you all and understanding that this is not something that we take for granted and not something that other communities have either I guess the question to the room to the folks in the room who do this work every day is how do what is the next step with this data because the data is important with the appreciation that it doesn't solely land on the schools to respond and and I think maybe Cindy you could speak to that and then generally for the group if people have thoughts on where it goes next because I do think after conversations like this if we don't know what's next things start to to fall flat the data is important to our partners again like us

▶ 1:41:34 Speaker 1: they're professionals in this field and they're going to do their work regardless of the data the data becomes important quite frankly is because it's

▶ 1:41:44 Jessica Dugan: how we get grants and I think how you get parents attention if that's where

▶ 1:41:49 Speaker 1: the conversation needs to go I don't think that's how you get parents attention to quite frankly I think parents look at the data and they say it's not my kid it's somebody else's kid I think what you get parents attention is unfortunately what mr. O'Connell says when we have a drinking party in town and you know 50 kids end up on the police roster but we never do that or

▶ 1:42:14 Speaker 1: unfortunately somebody dies or you know we end up suspending two three kids from a team for the season because they were involved in drug or alcohol use that's

▶ 1:42:29 Speaker 1: what gets parents attention and I don't know if there's enough enough stories I will tell you one of those things that is effective with the kids and again it's the stories that are effective with the kids when the older kids talk to the younger kids and say look at this is how you get screwed up this is how you don't get your college scholarship this is how you get kicked off the team the younger kids look up to the older kids I don't know if enough parents hear stories about kids who have had situations I'm gonna be very blunt here one of the

▶ 1:43:00 Speaker 1: things and I don't remember somebody made a comment about Melrose's affluence one of the things that happens in affluent towns is we take care of problems very quietly and parents and the greater community doesn't hear about the kid that was in a terrible place because of drugs or alcohol or suicidal thoughts as a school district we are bound by confidentiality and I would never want to violate a kid's confidentiality but I think there is a great tendency among parents to think well that's somebody else's kid who

▶ 1:43:45 Speaker 1: wouldn't be mine and so I don't know how you make it effective the other thing that I worry about quite frankly miss Dugan is that the numbers can be scary to young parents they may not be scary to us because we may sit here and say they're similar to other communities which should not be a comfort because that speaks to a statewide national problem but I think people also sometimes look at and say oh my god that city's going to hell in a handbasket you know so it's a fine line you walk here with statistics I think again to mr. O'Connell's point if you begin an education program for a lot of a lot of of parents beginning at like parent you or something else where you had the people who had the stories to share I think that's very impactful on on parents I think when you have a parent or a child and I'm thinking of a father and son I happen to know who do this and they turn sit up there and he says I'm an educator my kid was a Division one ballplayer and our life fell apart because he got addicted to oxy I look just like you and you and you my kid was on on track to become his dream and his life fell apart because of oxy I think when other parents see people who look like them who have lived this and have

▶ 1:45:14 Speaker 1: reaped the misfortune that is what is impactful to parents does anyone else

▶ 1:45:23 Speaker 4: have thoughts on next steps just very briefly I know I talked a lot before its parents and its students and I think Miss Guevara has shown that with her work in the middle school in high school you know there's an old adage the people closest to the problem are also closest to the solution and so whatever we do and I intend to follow through on this community forum with the help of all of you it should involve students there's an important voice there there's an important perspective there that all too often is overlooked not by Miss Guevara and others who are doing this work but the wider community so I hope we can

▶ 1:46:07 Jessica Dugan: focus on that thank you further questions comments discussion I just

▶ 1:46:11 Speaker 2: want to say that I am I really thank everyone for their participation and comments you know putting this together trying to bring something out I think even this conversation here is a fabulous beginning to continuing to address these issues to our community members we appreciate you all very much

▶ 1:46:36 Jessica Dugan: thanks so much for being here tonight thank you next on our agenda let me get