Schools

Parents Question Madison's Commitment To Anti-Drug Policies

Drug use is happening on school grounds, parents say

Drug use at James Madison High School has parents concerned — some say they or their children have witnessed it on campus — though the administration says most drug use is off school property.

Alison Noll was sitting in the bleachers of a Madison volleyball game last fall when she saw two male students nearby exchange a small plastic bag of marijuana.

Noll, a parent of three children in Fairfax County schools, said she reported what she saw to a school staff member at the game moments later, who said he was not sure if the law permitted him to perform a search, she said. He did not investigate, she said. The boys were not confronted, searched or questioned as they left the game, Noll said.

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She met with Principal Mark Merrell and an athletic administrator days later, who said the situation should have been handled differently. The students were never investigated, even after Noll gave them one student's name, she said.

“We should have handled it differently at Madison, we did not, and I have apologized numerous times for the way the staff member handled it,” Merrell said. “I accept full responsibility, and we have also addressed this issue with staff, security, and administrators and put measures in place so that we do not have another similar incident.”

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Heather Barber, a parent, school system teacher and longtime Vienna resident, said she feels the conversation about the incident has strayed from where it needs to be.

"The administration is really putting a lot of effort into defining that incident and that problem and trying to figure out whether it's 'perception' or 'truth' instead of moving forward with a solution," Barber said. "There's always a response questioning the truth of a matter, or a response of why we can’t do it, instead of focusing on the children and what we all might be able to do to make it better."

Noll used the incident to reach out to other parents in the community, including those in the Vienna-Madison Community Coalition, which in October began to host community meetings to address the issue. Her message and the replies she and Patch have received are in the PDF attached to this story.

The results of the 2008 Fairfax County Youth Survey, discussed during the VMCC meetings, revealed a picture of Madison that upset many: 25 percent of Madison High School seniors reported smoking marijuana within 30 days of the survey being taken — 50 percent more than the county average. Fifty-three percent of Madison seniors reported using alcohol in those same 30 days, 32 percent of them reporting they were binge drinking.

If the numbers weren’t enough, recent arrests underscored the problem in the area. A Madison student was arrested last month and charged with two counts of possession of marijuana with intent to distribute. In February, Vienna Police found a 17-year-old throwing a party with beer at his home and charged another with possession of a schedule 1 controlled substance (Hashish oil) and possession of marijuana. Three other teens were charged in separate vehicle stops with underage possession of alcohol, according to police documents. Because they are minors and their names were not released, where they attend school could not be confirmed.

Debbie Taylor said when her two daughters, now in college, were students at Madison, they told her the girls' bathroom on the second floor was "always full of pot smokers, so they didn’t feel comfortable going in."

Merrell said as not only a principal, but also as a parent, his No. 1 goal is to keep students safe and secure, which includes keeping the school drug-free. He said he has never smelled marijuana in the locker rooms, but has smelled it in the bathrooms before.

He says there have only been a half-dozen times students were caught smoking marijuana in the bathrooms, or in one instance, in an outdoor porta-potty.

"What I've heard from students, by and large, is that a lot of this is happening outside school property," he said.

Merell said he and school security and activity staff regularly monitor Facebook and other social media sites, where students post pictures of parties at which they are drinking or using other substances. The school can use that information to supplement suspicions they may have about in-school substance use, or, to bring a group of students or an athletic team in for questioning. But students cannot be punished in school for using substances outside of it, Merrell said.

"There's always a point to the school to be a responsible party and stop it ... but this overflows into the community," said Sgt. Bill Fulton, who oversees the county’s school resource officers.

Tim Arrington, director of Cluster II, told parents in a working group at the VMCC’s November meeting Merrell cannot be held solely responsible for every incident at the school.

"He holds the role of principal, but we all own it," he said. "It can't be one point person. All of this is not going to be worked out by one person."


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