Episode 510: Let's Talk Vaping: Partnerships That Promote Healing

We are facing a serious problem in our schools: underage vaping. Join us for this week's Red Ribbon episode of Classroom Conversations with Drew Hayes of Forsyth County Schools.

TRANSCRIPT

Ashley Mengwasser: Good day, educators. The Georgia Department of Education and Georgia Public Broadcasting are pleased to present a breath of fresh air to enhance your work day. This is Classroom Conversations, the platform for Georgia's teachers. I'm your host, Ashley Mengwasser, here to escort educators through your fog of struggle, to shine a lamplight where perspicacious people have gone before you. On this episode, we're walking into the woods to face a particularly insidious beast plaguing Georgia's schools. While all the foreboding references ash, well, it is the last week of October. I can hardly help myself. Are you thinking what I'm thinking? Spooks and scares. Totally. But it's not just Halloween time. It's also Red Ribbon Week in Georgia, the largest drug prevention campaign that invites people and communities to stand valiantly against drugs in our state. Today we're swatting away the cloudiness surrounding a prevalent issue facing Georgia's K-12 schools, including elementary actually. The problem is underage vaping. Today's vapes contain addictive substances like nicotine or THC, and a long list of chemicals like formaldehyde, VOCs, which stands for volatile organic compounds like diacetyl. This chemical leads to popcorn lung. And benzene, a chemical found in car exhaust linked to cancer. There's also cadmium, a toxic metal that increases the risk of breathing problems. And those are just a few of the chemicals on the longer list. In other words, dispute the popular refrain that we've all heard, these vapes operate with harmless water vapor. That's not true. Student vaping is a legal concern, as it is illegal for anyone under the age of 21 to vape, purchase, use, or possess vapor products in Georgia. But you know what? It's also a learning concern when the habit manifests at school and impedes a student's focus on their education. According to a presentation by Georgia DOE officials, during the prior academic year, 2023 to 2024, almost 17,500 students were disciplined for vaping. Good thing we've enlisted an audacious administrator to guide our lay of the land here. Please welcome to the podcast an alternative education enthusiast, an eternal optimist, and the principle of ACE, the Academies of Creative Education in Cumming part of Forsyth County schools. We're going to combat vape haze with Drew Haze. I think that's how it works. Thanks for joining us, Drew.

Drew Hayes: Thank you so much for having me.

Ashley Mengwasser: How are you today?

Drew Hayes: I am great. How about you?

Ashley Mengwasser: I'm excellent, thanks for asking, especially now that we're close to Halloween time. Are you a fan of Halloween yourself? I

Drew Hayes: I am, very much so. The whole family will be doing some Spider-Verse-themed something this year.

Ashley Mengwasser: Do you have your costume picked down?

Drew Hayes: I do.

Ashley Mengwasser: Who are you?

Drew Hayes: I am Venom.

Ashley Mengwasser: Oh, wow. So, help us understand, first of all, what is alternative education?

Drew Hayes: Alternative education, to me, typically alternative education is going to be when a kid gets in trouble and then they're not allowed to return back to base school. Usually when people say the alternative school, that's what they're talking about. For us at ACE, it's really more just non-traditional. So, instead of doing just a regular sit-down, face-to-face scheduled classroom, I have three different arenas. I have Gateway, which is more your alternative, where kids had gotten in trouble, they received a tribunal, so for a period of time, they've got to be out of the base school. Then I have another program called Forsythe Academy that is an open campus that students typically are there for about four hours a day. They work while they're there. And then they also work some from home online. But the goal for them is to either get caught up or to graduate early. Many of them have jobs and some other things, so the schedule's more flexible for them. And then even in this topic, I have some that are in recovery. They had issues, and then when their families moved to Forsythe County, they wanted them to continue in recovery, so they're able to work around that schedule. And we have a drug counselor, which we'll talk about later, but that's part of the support. And then K-12, we also have a virtual program, and so kids are completely online through that program and the majority of those kids will take most of their classes at the base school, but then they're taking a couple classes with us.

Ashley Mengwasser: I guess your campus might be defined differently. But as an administrator onto our topic of vaping, how much of a struggle is vaping on your campus?

Drew Hayes: It's a considerable struggle. I don't have it so much at Gateway anymore because we do wand metal detect kids as they're coming in and check them as they're walking in the door. So, we've been able to almost eliminate that in that environment. Where it's looser and more open campus, obviously an open scenario, we do catch, for our size population, a very high percentage of kids who end up having vapes. And what it ends up doing, we had a case this week, three different kids, and it tied up two administrators the majority of the day to investigate, and take care of, and try to make sure we understood what happened, and communicate with the families and make sure the kids were okay, all of that type of stuff. It is a significant issue and it's something that as if you're a building administrator, certainly APAA, that type of role. It's something that you learn to be on the lookout for all the time, because you can have kids who take something that they don't realize that they've taken. You can end up having some pretty significant issues. And so, one of the things that I'm big on is we check the bathrooms. It's an ongoing rotation. There's duty there, there's all these things. And we pay attention when a kid goes to the bathroom eight times in the course of a day or those type of things because you want to be able to catch it, not so much so you can punish the kid, but what are we doing? What intervention needs to happen? And I really feel what is so insidious about vapes is traditionally, and I'm old, so when I was younger, if somebody was smoking, mom or dad's going to smell cigarettes on them, or if they're smoking marijuana, they're going to smell that on them. Vapes have the ability to be almost scentless. It can go for an extended period of time without the parents realizing that's what's happening. And so, what it puts a school and an administrator in a difficult position is having the conversation with the family, and the family accepting that this is what's going on-

Ashley Mengwasser: This happened.

Drew Hayes: And this is what happened, because it's a surprise to them in many cases and they struggle with it. So, it is just really important to understand all of that when you're calling home, when you're addressing these things, et cetera, along the way. And I'm very grateful. I have a fantastic team in Lewis Daniel and Gail Freund in particular, who do the majority of that. And they at this point, their old hat at all those calls of building those relationships with the families.

Ashley Mengwasser: And in all of this, your only objective is protecting these students and protecting their learning experience, right?

Drew Hayes: Correct.

Ashley Mengwasser: I think what I don't understand and maybe would help our listeners too, is how could this get into the hands of elementary students?

Drew Hayes: I think a lot of times it's mostly going to be older brothers and sisters or parents at home. Very rarely is it a scenario of out of nowhere this kid went into a store or something, and made a purchase. It's usually they were around somebody older. I do think the problem is, I don't want to say they're everywhere because your exaggerated freak-out scenario, but they're not uncommon. And I think for me in the conversation I have a lot with people, parents will say, "Well, what can I do?" I say, "First and foremost, you can be a great role model. Meaning don't use yourself, don't allow it in your home. Talk to your neighbors about it. Have that general conversation because that right there will eliminate X amount of problem and expectation in terms of what's there." And I think the THC element has really complicated it in a way that a lot of parents and sometimes a lot of educators don't understand, because THC vapes are very common. Dab pens also another term but heavily used. When I was a kid in high school, again, a hundred years ago, THC was about 2.4% concentration if somebody were to smoke a joint or a bowl or any of these things. And in the '90s there was a shift to about 4, 4 and change in terms of percent. Now if you're getting a dab pen, or a vape, or one of these, or an edible also, another thing that people are using, it can be 30% on up to 80%. And so, it's like having a conversation with your kid and you're like, "I tried a beer when I was whatever what." It's not such a big deal. Kids are going to experiment. Well, instead of a beer, they're drinking a bottle of moonshine. And this is the level of difference. And then also I had no idea you were doing it because it's tiny-

Ashley Mengwasser: So clandestine.

Drew Hayes: That whole scenario. So, I think vigilance and understanding that is a big part.

Ashley Mengwasser: Yeah. I don't think you're overstating when you say that these are everywhere because just think about these smoke shops that are on almost every corner these days. I think that the access is a key reason that students have this. What other reasons do they give for picking up vaping when you talk to them?

Drew Hayes: Well, I work with drug counselors, and I have one at our place, and the general conversation that we have, it's fun for kids. It's why anyone drinks alcohol or does drugs for the most part. And certainly at that age, they are trying something different. So, that's exciting. And then on top of it, it's fun or they feel good for X period of time. And especially when certain kids are going to be wired in a certain way, where they're going to be drawn to that immediately once they go and do that. And obviously there's lots of science behind that and figuring out who those people are is a thing. And then also feel like you've got some kids who they don't feel comfortable, or they don't feel valued, or they don't feel good, and now they feel good, they don't want that feeling to go away. The problem is obviously it's a very short-lived cycle that then they're in trouble with. And so, I think that's it.

Ashley Mengwasser: From a whole child standpoint, we're dealing with the whole child. And they have other things in their lives, their emotional experience, what's going on at home, things educators confront every day. How do your academies confront and respond to vaping incidents? Is your policy posted for students to see?

Drew Hayes: Well, county has a code of conduct. Kids sign agreements when they come in, stuff is posted on the door. So, it's pretty common knowledge what's allowed, what's not allowed. I think the biggest thing for us is we're just on the lookout for it. We have open conversations about it. We talk with families about, and there's not really judgment at all on our part. For me, the conversation is, I want you to live your absolute best life, and I don't believe that's possible unless you're sober. If you're on other substances, then that's not you and you're not going to live out what you want. And you may not see that right at this moment, but eventually you will. Also, it's funded by the county is we have two drug counselors in the county. One of them is at ACE. I'd gotten them years ago through a series of grants and there was a progression in terms of how much of that we did. But right now it's Gabby Britton and she's fantastic.

Ashley Mengwasser: Go Gabby.

Drew Hayes: Yeah. And one of the things we do is immediately we let the kid check in with Gabby. We let the family check in with Gabby. We talk through these things and ask the kid, "What support do you need? Do you need to talk about this? Is this something you're having a hard time quitting? What is going on?" So, that it's not a, you're just trying to get me in trouble sort of scenario. That's really not where it is. And if it's possible to avoid a tribunal, we do. The problem is when it's THC, when it's a substance like that, it's much, much harder. And for us right now it's around one in four, when we catch a vape or when we find something about one in four, one in five has THC in it at this point.

Ashley Mengwasser: That intervention that you're describing is the opposite of punitive, like you said, it's very student supportive. Do you think when you're having those conversations with them, do students and young adults, do they fully understand the dangers of vaping that I mentioned in the introduction?

Drew Hayes: I think they understand that it's dangerous. One of the phrases I don't fully love that people bring up a lot is if you know better, you do better. To me it's, if you know better, you have an opportunity to do better. I eat too much sugar and fast food. And I know not to do that, but I do it anyway. I know I'm supposed to work out at least four days a week for 30 minutes. I know I'm not supposed to have screen time after a certain time before bed and get at least eight hours. We all don't follow those things even though we know better.

Ashley Mengwasser: I feel so convicted.

Drew Hayes: I'm sorry. Sorry. That was not the intent. And so, with kids, I think it's the same thing. They know better, but then it's a function of we've got to develop a different habit and we've got to make some commitments that are going to help you be better and be safe. And again, kids at that age and we don't think it's going to happen to us or that there's going to be some larger problem. And I think the drift feels very slow. Matt Myer from Insight, who's one of the people that we work with, who's the one we contract out for the drug counselors, it's through his program in Alpharetta. He talked about his story, his personal story. He's in recovery. And the analogy he uses is like one degree off. If you take a plane, and it's one degree off, and you just stay one degree off, you'll end up way off course from what you realize.

Ashley Mengwasser: Wrong destination.

Drew Hayes: But at the start you're like, "I'm not that far off." And it's not that. I think with kids that's how it is at first it's, I'm just like, we're making a big deal out of nothing.

Ashley Mengwasser: A powerful metaphor.

Drew Hayes: And then all of a sudden, we're in trouble because we're way off course.

Ashley Mengwasser: Yeah, you tease this up, so let's go right to that, the community partnership piece. Because you have a collaborator who's working with you, who's stepped forward. And collaboration with the community organization probably really helps this because you've got that community power robustness. So, tell me about your collaborators.

Drew Hayes: A 100%. Matt was the start. Matt Myer at Insight. And he volunteered at Gateway Academy for years before I'd even gotten there. He ran a student group at just an AA type or NA type group once every two weeks with kids just on a completely voluntary basis. Cindy Mills-Jones, who was the county commissioner, she was the head, she's now stepping down or retiring, but she has been a partner with us. She and Matt helped us to get a much larger grant, as did... we have an Ed foundation that got me a small grant to start with some more drug counseling. And when that was successful, Cindy Mills was able to help get a larger one. And they also partnered with Sheriff Ron Freeman at our sheriff's department. He used drug seizure money in our county to contribute $10,000 for the year to help with the counseling funding effort. And that was humongous. I think one of the resources that a lot of school systems don't realize they have is their sheriff's office, and just talking with those folks, and again, Sheriff Freeman has been a champion of this every step of the way like as we've gone and done it. I've also got two moms who they were probably as instrumental in changing the conversation for us as anyone else. Both of the ladies call them the moms.

Ashley Mengwasser: I was about to say, is this the organization name? I need to look up the two moms.

Drew Hayes: They're the moms for me. Their sons both went through drug addiction and are actively in recovery. And when we do parent nights where the parents come and learn about what's going on, we require the families of the kids who got in trouble and went to Gateway because of a drug issue for the parents to come and attend a session over the course of that semester while they're there. And I used to get just a huge amount of pushback on that from the parents. "I shouldn't have to come," these type of things. When they hear from a mom who struggled with the same thing and they understand that this is not necessarily a reflection at all on them, that they're going to need help and support along the way, it really changes the relationship of what is going on. And in fact, a lot of them, I told my drug counselors, I'm like, "They're mad at you because you are like their child who was a drug addict and they're not okay with that." And so, hearing from a mom who talks through her struggles, and ups and downs and all of that, is a much bigger group of support. And so, one of the questions you'd asked me earlier, and I'm not trying to steal the question, but you're like, what are some of the solutions? To me, those are big ones, getting parents who are already dealing with this issue involved in having a voice and supporting one another because if it's whack-a-mole, me versus the kids, if it's whack-a-mole, me versus the parents, we're not really going to move the needle in the direction that we need to. Whereas when the parents are on the same page with the school who's then trying to do what's best for the kid and the kid can from at least a limited standpoint, see that's what's trying to happen. I think it really creates something different.

Ashley Mengwasser: Yeah. And the moms, is there anything moms can't do? And the dads, too. And together, united force definitely formidable. What impact has vaping had district-wide? Not just at the school level, but I'm thinking of the students' health experience. What is the vibe in the community? What can you report?

Drew Hayes: It's something that's a frustration for certain amongst any administration that exists because, again, you're playing whack-a-mole, you're chasing down things and checking on kids. And then when something happens, it can be scary. A kid can fall out because they've smoked something and they don't know what it is that they've had. We've had ambulance visits and kids taken to the ER. And it's just scary. It's not what anybody wants for their students or their kids. And within the traditional realm of education, like I always joke, when I got my specialist degree, that was when I got my certification as an administrator, you can be in charge of a building. There was no time or energy spent on what are you going to do about drug issues? What are you going to do about these type of things? There was so much stuff that you cover, you don't cover that. And so, I think the comfort level a lot of times with administrators just on what do I need to do with this? Beyond your, okay, if they did this, then this is the discipline consequence. How do you work through this to move, and change a culture, and get your community with you? So, I think it's hard, but no, it is definitely something that we talk a lot about. And again, this past weekend we had a big event. I went to a football game with some of the visitors and did all this. And part of the conversation with the principals that were there were about vaping issues that they had dealt with over the course of that week.

Ashley Mengwasser: What are they reporting?

Drew Hayes: Just seeing it a good bit, and the frustration of always feeling like you're behind it and wanting to catch it so that it doesn't blow up into something bigger.

Ashley Mengwasser: And you have great empathy for these kids, Drew. You said one of the best things about ACE is that you're there to build individual connections with your students. You want to have real relationships with them.

Drew Hayes: Yes, ma'am.

Ashley Mengwasser: So, I imagine when you sit down to talk to them about the vaping issue, I understand why you want it to be supportive because there's that relationship on the line. But can you recall any conversations with students who they may be about their reasons why or what they're going through that maybe have kept you up at night?

Drew Hayes: The ones that keep me up at night the most are the ones that they can't see where they are right then. One young man comes to mind that one of the byproducts of THC, one of the consequences can be that you are paranoid. This is a scenario that's there. And this young man constantly like, "Everybody's out to get me. These people are..." and I'm like, "No, this is because you're smoking all the time. This isn't a mental health issue for you. This is a THC issue."

Ashley Mengwasser: It's the habit.

Drew Hayes: And until you get clean for X amount of time, this is going to be very hard for you to move past. And Matt Myer, I'm friends with him and obviously I meet with him every other week as part of this. In one of the stories he always tells is a group that they worked with that were young heroin addicts or Opioid addicts from 18 to 28, and he said the commonality that he saw was lots of marijuana smoking from an early age on that 100% of the group that they were working with. That was where it started. And so, that's a concern for me. When the kids come to us, we also survey them anonymous, just when did you start? What did you start with? These type of things. And at this point, and again, it was, I don't want to say shock to me, but it was surprising. It's not alcohol. It's THC almost across the board. And so, it's a shift from the way I grew up. It's a shift from the way you grew up. And I think it's important as parents, adults, educators, that we understand that's where it is. Again, our average group too, the average kid right at or just under 13 years of age when they tried for the first time. And then again, my concern has to do with the potency level of what's currently out there. So, it doesn't take long for this to be a significant habit for them. And so, being able to intervene, break that as quickly as possible is really big deal.

Ashley Mengwasser: Because 30%, I mean, I can't imagine functioning doing this podcast on 30%. These are students in school. And there really is something happening there. There's an intersection of sobriety, safety in their lives and success, and how all those things have to be happening in order for students to reach their learning outcomes. So, let's add another S to the equation. Let's go back to solutions, which you also helped me get into a little bit. And I want to think about this at the administrative level for administrators who are facing this barrier in their schools, but also for classroom teachers because they might need to do or watch for different things and react differently. So, what is your advice to our administrators listening and separately to our classroom teachers?

Drew Hayes: I think for the administrators, it's having an honest assessment of your building, and talking to kids and families on a very open basis, and teachers and what they're seeing, looking at your data. And then my recommendation of the starting point every time is, get connected to whatever NA, AA, whatever recovery community group is close by with you and see what you can get started, even if it's just once every two weeks. And see where that leads, see what conversations come from that, and offer that to kids and families so that they know they have a place to go and a resource. And that conversation is starting because I think a lot of people, it's, "I don't know where to start." And then I've had a drug counselor and we don't have a drug counselor because we don't have a drug counselor. You have to baby step your way in. And we started at once every two weeks, and then it was twice a week for an hour before we ended up jumping into the larger setup. But it is been a game changer for us. And I think the biggest difference that I see as an administrator at Gateway, I was in constant whack-a-mole, finding pills, trying catching kids clearly coming in the door high, trying to do different things. And the shift now is the kids want to be... the vast majority want to be sober, and they're encouraging one another to be sober. And part of that's the program that they're working through and that they're taking a leadership role in that. But they'll let me know, "You need to drug test. It's been a while, Mr. Hayes, since you've drugged... you need to drug test. And you need to be checking here and you need to be checking," those type of things. I wouldn't have gotten that from the kids in the past. I think for the teachers, it's just watching very closely and getting to know your kids, and being able to have conversations with them and tell them, "We love you. I just want you to be as great as you possibly can be, and I want you to be healthy. And drugs can't do that. Vaping is not a positive. And we don't want that in our room, and I want to know if we've got an issue," and those types of things. Because I think without the, I guess cooperation, without the partnership with the kids, then it's a game for them to hide from you. And we're going to lose that one against 30. You're going to lose that game. You're going to lose it one against five. You're certainly going to lose it one against 30. I also think just being willing and understanding that duties like, I'm going to check the bathroom. I'm going to come by and do these things. And even though it's not pleasant, and it's not fun, and it doesn't always go the outcome that you want it to, it changes the expectation for everybody. And in certain buildings, and it was this way when I was a kid, you just avoided certain bathrooms. I'm not going to go there. That's not a safe environment for kids to thrive in. And then you're battling whatever comes out of that. I think we've all just got to be willing to go in. I'm in bathrooms all the time. My APs tease me about it, I'm like, no, this is where it's mostly happening or this is where we're having it, so this is where we're going to be. We're going to make it hard to do it-

Ashley Mengwasser: To hide this.

Drew Hayes: And this is who we're going to be very out in the open,

Ashley Mengwasser: Bring it to the light. And those students who are invested and who are participating in these educational opportunities, they're taking some accountability for the community as well and wanting everybody to respond appropriately. So, I totally get that. I learned that there's also some technological supports for this. They have vape detectors. Have you heard of this?

Drew Hayes: They do.

Ashley Mengwasser: What's your stance on that?

Drew Hayes: I don't think they've worked great in terms of what I've seen over the time. And then I think they have false positives, and then I think people are just... you end up chasing a lot. I'm not anti the idea one way or the other, but that's not where we've leaned.

Ashley Mengwasser:

You're taking a more systemic approach, going to the root. This is a behemoth, it's a problem, but you've got a stalwart response at ACE. And I'll always share optimism from you, Principal Hayes.

Drew Hayes: Yeah, 100%. This is an issue that we can conquer. But I do think there has to be commitment community-wide to do that. And I'll bring up, again, it's getting to be Halloween. I don't want to be on the negative side with it. 18 to 45, the number one killer in the United States is drug overdoses. And so, understanding that you don't all of a sudden go 18 and drug overdose. You don't all of a sudden go 20 and drug overdose. Usually there's an early cause or a started behavior. This is worth our time, our energy, and our effort because it's our kids and it's our community.

Ashley Mengwasser: Exactly. A community wide approach definitely stands out to me about this episode.

Drew Hayes: Yes, ma'am.

Ashley Mengwasser: Thanks for all you're doing and thanks for your gentleness, Drew.

Drew Hayes: I appreciate it. Thank you.

Ashley Mengwasser: You're an awesome guest. I'm glad to have you here.

Drew Hayes: Thank you for having me.

Ashley Mengwasser: Audience, suffice it to say, student vaping is widespread. And maybe it is a more menacing threat than we originally thought our students are facing, but the situation is far from hopeless. You heard it from Principal Hayes. When we respond deliberately, exhausting all the options, schools can promote ongoing health education about drugs, alcohol and tobacco. They can ensure clarity, and they can enforce clear consequences around a school's vape-free policy, and reach out to collaborators to combine forces. So, in celebration of Red Ribbon Week, we won't let this Darth Vapor win. See what I did there? You're a great teacher. Thank you for listening. So, we can thank students for not vaping. Now we can exhale. We'll be bringing you more school improvement momentum with next week's topic. Don't miss it. I'm Ashley, goodbye for now.