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Sex in high school

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By Patrick Cronin
pcronin@seacoastonline.com

HAMPTON - "They are shocking, but real. Statistics don’t lie."
Those were the comments of Winnacunnet High School student Daryl Velez after school officials presented the findings of the 2005 Youth Risk Behavior Survey to the Winnacunnet Cooperative School Board on Wednesday night.

The survey revealed 71 percent of students have tried alcohol while 42.6 percent of students have smoked marijuana.

It also showed more students are sexually active compared to results from the 2001 survey and 36.9 percent had sex with more than one person in the last three months.

Talley Westerburg, a school social worker at WHS, explained the survey was created in 1989 by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention to monitor the risk behavior of the students.

Roughly 800 students from all four grades took the survey, which looks at violence, tobacco use, alcohol, drug use, sexual behaviors and physical activity.

Westerburg compared this year’s results with the 2001 survey of Winnacunnet students as well as how the WHS 2005 results compared with state results.

As compared to the 2001 WHS results, the good news is that students reported lower regular cigarette smoking, lower lifetime and regular use of alcohol, marijuana, methamphetamines and fewer suicide attempts.

But the numbers are still not what they would like to see, Westerburg said.

WHS students who drank alcohol in the last month dropped from 49 percent to 45 percent, while those who smoked marijuana dropped from 28 percent to 23.2 percent.

Roughly 10 percent of WHS students have tried cocaine, while 2.7 percent have used heroin.

One of the more shocking results was 28 percent of students were offered, sold, or given an illegal drug on school property by someone in the past 12 months.

Westerburg said while more students are sexually active, condom use is up compared with the 2001 results.

Westerburg said 46.5 students stated they have had sexual intercourse, which is a 7.1 percent increase over the 2001 results.

But the use of birth control is not as high as the state average.

Another statistic Westerburg noted was that 9.4 percent of students reported that they were hit by their boyfriend or girlfriend, and 8.5 percent said they were physically forced to have sexual intercourse when they did not want to.

Although not statistically significant, WHS students reported higher scores on all suicide-related survey questions as compared to the New Hampshire state average, Westerburg said.

Roughly 29 percent of the students "felt so sad or hopeless for almost every day for two weeks or more in a row that they stopped doing some of their usual activities," while 8.4 percent "actually attempted suicide one or more times during the last 12 months."

Chris Singleton, chairman of the Winnacunnet School Board, said the results of the survey were an eye opener.

"These issues are with us," Singleton said. "But these problems are not unique to Winnacunnet. It’s happening in Exeter, Portsmouth and every other high school in the United States."

The School Board plans to share the results with WHS faculty, the student council and parents as well as other schools in SAU 21.

Board members also plan to seek out community involvement and input on how to address the problems noted.

"We can’t solve this alone," Singleton said. "We need selectmen, police and everyone in the community to work as a team."

"Now that we know about it, we can do something about," said Maria Brown, a member of the Winnacunnet School Board.

The survey was not all negative, Westerburg noted.

The good news is that WHS students are active and enthusiastic participants in their community, that they value grades and education, parental involvement, exercise and health and they feel safe in their school.

The survey showed 87.4 percent of the students report that they receive grades of mostly A’s, B’s and C’s.

And 61.2 percent of the students "think they definitely will complete a post high school program such as vocational training program, military service or college.

Singleton said the board will discuss the survey and what can be done to address the results at its next meeting.

Some suggestions brought up during the meeting include expanding the DARE program, establishing a healthy kids task force and expanding its involvement with Seacoast Safety Net, a drug and alcohol prevention coalition.

http://www.seacoastonline.com/news/hampton/03242006/news/94299.htm

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