KINGWOOD, W.Va. — Preston County Schools Superintendent Stephen Wotring said drugs shouldn’t be a problem at the high school level, let alone at the middle and elementary school levels.
But, they are.
“We’ve gotta wake people up to what’s going on. We just have not done a good job in our system of educating people about this – our students, our staff or our public,” reflected Wotring.
Wotring is organizing a drug task force he hopes will cut down on a disturbing trend he’s seeing as an administrator.
“We’ve expelled more students this year than ever before,” said Wotring. “It’s not only high school. A vast majority of these expulsions have occurred in middle school. And, we’ve recently had it show up in our elementary school.”
Wotring is reaching out to police, the county’s prosecuting attorney, health care representatives, business professionals, parents and students to develop an educational program to warn families of dangers they may be overlooking.
According to Wotring, illegal drugs like marijuana aren’t the only things showing up on school property.
“A lot of this is prescription drug use where kids are getting this from family and relatives sometimes unknowingly.”
Most recently, he said very young students are are emulating drug use that is a problem in a number of communities in north central West Virginia.
“They’re making homemade devices to snort whatever they can crush up their nose. It may be an over the counter medicine that they are finding in their homes and trying. But, I don’t think people realize how pervasive this problem is,” Wotring warned.
The Preston County Schools drug task force is in very initial stages of development. Wotring mentioned it at an early April school board meeting.
“You know, I can keep throwing kids out of school right and left. But, we’re not changing anything. There’s an education piece that is missing to all of this,” said Wotring.
Wotring said his goal would be to find as many ways as possible to disperse information on the dangers of drug use to families and their children.