Student Committee on Drug Abuse Education Visits Local High School

Student pharmacists provide information on drugs of abuse and the process of addiction

By Allison Kobin
January 27, 2009

Over the winter break, students from the University of Maryland School of Pharmacy’s Student Committee on Drug Abuse Education (SCODAE) program spent time teaching at Elkton High School in Cecil County, Maryland. These students have spent the past semester learning about drugs of abuse and the process of addiction in pharmacy school and shared their new found knowledge with teenagers, who are especially vulnerable to pressures to try drugs. SCODAE’s mission is to provide unbiased drug education to middle school and high school students. The program at Elkton High School provides a unique perspective on drugs of abuse and addiction, with students teaching students.

“We advertise our program to many schools throughout the Baltimore area, and Elkton High has requested our program for the past 5 years,” says Allison Kobin, a second year pharmacy student and vice president of SCODAE. “As future pharmacists this opportunity provides us with a great chance to practice our communication and presentation skills while at the same time allowing us to share pharmacy knowledge with high school students. The feedback from the teachers and administration at Elkton has always been very positive, and we hope to continue working with them in the future.”

This year, 19 student pharmacists across all four years of the program traveled to Elkton and provided more than 45 hours of instructional time. The School of Pharmacy students taught a five part program over the course of three days, covering topics such as principles of drug addiction, how drugs affect the body and mind, cocaine and stimulant drugs, alcohol and depressant drugs, marijuana and psychedelic drugs, and current trends in adolescent drug abuse. The Elkton students were part of a freshman seminar class. The pharmacy students utilized the white board to explain complicated concepts, distributed hand outs to the students, and brought in props to help educate the high school students.

“Most young people are exposed to drugs of abuse some time before they leave high school,” says Sheryl Thedford, a SCODAE member second year student pharmacist. “The facts that we provide about drugs of abuse may help them make more educated decisions about drugs. As a volunteer teacher, this experience was very rewarding because I was able to contribute to my community. It was akin to how I, as a pharmacist, hope to help my patients make informed decisions about their medication use and health care.”

SCODAE next plans to take their program to a private school in Baltimore City over spring break and hopes to expand to schools in Montgomery County in the near future.