December 17, 2019
By: Dwayne Page
Thirty eight fifth graders at DeKalb West School graduated from the D.A.R.E. (Drug Abuse Resistance Education) program in a ceremony Monday afternoon.
D.A.R.E. is a DeKalb County Sheriff’s Department-led series of classroom lessons that teaches fifth graders in DeKalb County how to resist peer pressure and live productive drug and violence-free lives.
Lewis Carrick, the Sheriff’s Department’s School Resource Officer at DeKalb West School, doubles as the D.A.R.E Officer instructor for the fifth grade classes.
The 10 week course identifies fundamental, basic skills and developmental processes needed for healthy development including: Self-awareness and management, Responsible decision making, Understanding others, Relationship and communication skills, and Handling responsibilities and challenges.
D.A.R.E. believes that if you can teach youth to make safe and responsible decisions, it will guide them to healthy choices, not only about drugs, but across all parts of their lives. As they grow to be responsible citizens, they will lead healthier and more productive drug-free lives.
As part of the course, students prepared essays on what they have learned from D.A.R.E. and a winner was selected from each fifth grade class. The winners at DeKalb West School were Kenadee Prichard from Mrs. Nadina Martel’s class and Hannah Brown from Mrs. Jeanna Caplinger’s class. Prichard was the overall winner and she received a $50 check from General Sessions and Juvenile Court Judge Bratten Cook, II.
Judge Cook also addressed the class.
“You have been blessed and you will remember years from now what Officer Carrick has taught you this year. Each day you have hundreds of decisions to make and the time may come when you will be faced with difficult choices when it comes to peer pressure and drugs, alcohol, tobacco, vaping and those things. When friends of yours do those things, they may try and talk you into it. If they do, just say no. Tell them I am not going to mess up my life. Every week (in court) I see kids who have messed up their lives by fooling with drugs, alcohol, and tobacco. Many of them are kids from good families that just made a bad decision. My advice to you is think before you act. Use the brain that God gave you,” said Judge Cook.
D.A.R.E. students in Mrs. Caplinger’s Class are Hunter Ballew, Cayleigh Barber, Ben Barton, Hannah Brown, Debra Busey, Jennifer Fortune, Thomas Foutch, Justin Howard, Miah Johnson, Kaylee Kent, Cecil Ketchum, Amber McDaniel, Preslee Merriman, Kason Nichols, Izzy Prichard, Kaylee Redmon, Leyton Scarbrough, Matt Shahan, and Wyatt Young.
D.A.R.E students in Mrs. Martel’s Class are Alexis Bennett, Chloe Boyd, Ethan Brown, Timothy Campbell, Charlie Cripps, Ben Driver, Jesse Foutch, Emily Fry, Olivia George, Victoria Harn, Eli Johnson, Michael Justice, Raegan Murphy, Elliott Nelson, Kenadee Prichard, Taytum Reeder, Alexis Reynolds, Mary Jane Scott, and Chase Young.