The updated Drug Strategy:
Blueprint for drug prevention
multi-component programmes can make a difference
Blueprint is a research programme that will measure the impact of drug education on young people through work with schools, families and parents, the media and communities. The programme is partnership between the Home Office the Department for Education and Skills and the Department of Health, it has been developed after a review of materials from 'what works' programmes. Evaluation will determine what impact there has been on behaviour and how well the programme complements personal and social Health Education.
The programme is targeted at young people aged 11-13 and involve approximately 50 secondary schools in the midlands and north-west of England.
Principles of prevention
The National Institute on Drug Abuse in the USA identifies a number of lessons learned from research and practice in prevention:
- prevention programmes should be designed to enhance 'protective factors' (such as promoting conventional norms about drug use, reinforcing parents' skills for better family communication, and encouraging parents to spend 'quality time ' with their children and play an active role in their lives) Programmes should also move towards reversing or reducing known risk factors'(such as perceptions of approval of drug-using behaviours and an inflated estimate of the extent of drug use).
- prevention programmes should target all forms of substance misuse, including the use of tobacco, alcohol, Cannabis, and inhalants.
- prevention programmes should help people develop skills to resist drugs when offered, strengthen personal commitments against drug use, increase social skills (for example in communications, peer relationships help-seeking and assertiveness) and reinforce attitudes against drug use.
- prevention programmes for adolescents should include interactive methods such as peer discussion groups, rather than instructional teaching techniques alone.
- prevention programmes should involve parents or carers in order to reinforce what children are learning, stimulate discussion and encourage families to develop 'policies' on substance use.
- prevention programmes that reinforce school efforts (multi-component programmes are more effective than school interventions, and
- prevention programmes should be age-specific, developmentally appropriate and culturally sensitive.
Connecting the components
Blueprint will follow the above principles in developing a prevention programme comprising several components. The core of the initiative is the school programme, but it also reaches out to parents and the wider community. the thinking is that prevention targeted at young people at school 'radiates' out to effect the family and peer groups.The benefits gained by the young people are fed back to their parents, encouraging participation in the programme.
The programme provides support for parents to work with their children on drug education homework and promotes the learning on family communication skills. Local media coverage reinforces prevention messages and encourages participation. The intention is to both to directly promote children's ability to resist drug use and to indirectly to promote it by enhancing the skills of parents and teachers in drug prevention, and to promote and to support non-drug use as a social norm in the community.
What can Blueprint achieve?
Blueprint will measure effectiveness in terms of young people's use of alcohol, tobacco, solvents, cannabis, and any drug. But there are many other potential benefits of the programme, such as:
- harm minimization;
- an increase in the quality of communication between parents and children on the subject of drug prevention;
- young people experiencing greater involvement in, the satisfaction from, drug education; and
- benefits arising from enhanced training and support of teachers.
- Further to programme development in 2003, an enhanced drug education curriculum for year 7 and 8 9with educational support resources for teachers, pupils and parents) will be delivered throughout 2004 and 2005. evaluation results will be available in 2007.
http://www.drugs.gov.uk/young-people/blueprint/strategy/?version=1
Information collated by the Drug Strategy Directorate in the Home Office-April 2003.