You might have seen the encouraging headline in the paper a few days ago: “Drug Use Down at Manheim Township”. Here is a link to the entire story and to the graph behind it:

Drug Use Down at Manheim Township article

Drug Use Graph

Seeing it, initially, I was encouraged. The story, however, (rightly) spends a lot of it time poking holes in the data. Reading it is a good exercise in logic. The graph says that drug use is down, but we need to distinguish! The comparison is between 2007 sophomores and 2009 seniors. Apples to apples you say. I am not so sure and neither are the people at Manheim Township. I guess we should be happy. If everyone is being honest (a question that the story raises) and was honest in 2007, then we have cause for joy. Fewer kids, it seems, are using all sorts of drug. It is hard to discover, however, how joyous we should be. The supposition by MT school administration is that their education efforts are working. Let’s hope so, but there seems to be a lot of evidence that calls this conclusion into question. Here are a few of the problems:

1. The numbers lack context. How do they compare to national and local numbers? What is happening at other schools (those numbers are listed in the graph, but they do not make apples to apples comparisons).
2. The story (and people at the school) are raising questions about student honest on the survey. This should be taken into account because MT instituted a drug testing program, so kids are probably scared to tell the truth (let’s hope scared enough to stop the drug use).
3. I am not sure how we should compare one group to itself two years later and feel good. How are 2009 sophomores doing v. 2007 sophomores. This statistic would be very telling. It is missing and this is very concerning. Let’s hope that the general trend is down. (I have learned, however, that when a number is missing it is usually missing for a reason.)
4. Things like the economy should also be consider (as the story rightly points out). Kids in MT have less expendable income now, so they buy drugs less often.

These stats are hailed as a great thing, but they are prima fascia troubling. About a fifth of the students in Lancaster County are “bing drinking.” Slightly less than a fifth are smoking pot (never a good sign for future productivity).

Deep questions remain unanswered! Why would some many kids in the most affluent suburb in the most (uniformly) affluent county in the region being using drugs so frequently? I think that we are running a deficit—and I do not mean the financial deficit that our country is piling up every day. We are running a deficit of hope. We are educating children, but to what end? We tell them in science class that life is a cosmic accident and we wonder why they want their minds to evaporate. There is a place to go to—or I should say a man to consult—to find answers. His name is Jesus. Until we make peace with him, the children of our culture will seek escape because without Him there is no lasting hope.