The Drug Abuse Resistance Education (D.A.R.E.) program, the pioneer prevention effort founded in Los Angeles in 1983, is going high-tech, interactive, and decision-model-based.  Gleaming with the latest in prevention science and teaching techniques, D.A.R.E. is reinventing itself as part of a major national research study that promises to help teachers and administrators cope with ever-evolving federal prevention program requirements and the thorny issues of school violence, budget cuts, and terrorism.

Gone is the old-style approach to prevention in which an officer stands behind a podium and lectures students in straight rows.  New D.A.R.E. officers are trained as "coaches" to support kids who are using research-based refusal strategies in high-stakes peer-pressure environments.  New D.A.R.E. students as of 2004 are getting to see for themselves tangible proof of how substances diminish mental activity, emotions, coordination and movement.  Practical exercises are bringing home the social and legal consequences of drug use and violence.

Since its local introduction in 1990, thousands of Douglas County 5th and 6th graders have successfully completed the D.A.R.E. program.  One of the oldest and largest substance abuse and violence prevention programs in the United States, D.A.R.E. is also the most extensive drug prevention program in the country.

D.A.R.E. is a police officer-led series of classroom lessons that teach children how to resist violence and the pressure to use tobacco, alcohol and other drugs.  The core program targets 5th and 6th grade students who are exiting elementary school and entering the junior high school level, a time when they are very vulnerable to peer pressure.  In addition to teaching the D.A.R.E. Program, the teaching officers also visit with the kindergarten through fourth grade classes and focus on child safety and prevention issues.

The Douglas County Sheriff’s Office dedicates three full-time deputies to teach the D.A.R.E. program.   The Castle Rock Police Department, Parker Police Department, and the Lone Tree Police Department also provide an officer to teach the curriculum to their local elementary students.  Our goal is to work with the Douglas County School District in maintaining a positive role in the lives of our youth.

The D.A.R.E. curriculum is provided to students in nearly all of Douglas County’s elementary schools with the goal of preventing drug abuse among children by teaching them important skills through a focused prevention strategy.  Students are taught skills, and strategies that help them in today’s society.

Douglas County Sheriff’s Office, D.A.R.E. Officers

Deputy Dave Joly – 303-814-7005 ext 6863

Deputy Jay Martin – 303-814-7005 ext 6348

Deputy Ann Walton – 303-814-7005 ext 7001

For more information about the D.A.R.E. Program go to http://www.dare.com