Random Drug Testing in the Philippines Position Paper

Department of Education (DepEd) dictates the implementation of D.O. 40, s. 2017 also known as the "Guidelines for the Conduct of Random Drug Testing in Public and Private Secondary Schools on all public and private secondary schools in the Philippines." High school students will start to undergo random drug testing starting this September 2017. Duterte administration’s “war on drugs” prompts the execution of random drug testing to students as a way to address the rising drug abuse rate amongst teenagers. The purpose of drug testing is to measure the prevalence of drug use and to provide intervention programs. Science and Technology Education Center – High School (STEC – HS) believes that this order should be implemented because of the following reasons: it allows for early detection, it can serve as a drug deterrent, it promotes the feeling of safety, and lastly, it can aid in proper counseling.

The first advantage to point out is, random drug testing allows for early detection of drug abuse. According to DepED secretary, Leonor Briones on a CNN interview, "Random test aims to provide appropriate interventions to those who will be tested positive for dangerous drug use, which will help the student stop further use and/or abuse of the substance." Drug test will help identify students who are using drugs, in this way, the government will be able to control the growing number of drug-users through rehabilitation programs. Early detection of drug abuse among teens is vital as according to a 2015 statistics of Dangerous Drug Board of the Philippines, around forty-nine percent (48.85%) of drug-users started taking drugs in their teen-age years. This means that the high school period is one of the most crucial moments for drug use. In order to prevent future drug addicts, the government should first start addressing drug problems of high school students.

Second, this institution thinks that the implementation of random drug testing can discourage drug use among students. According to an article of National Institute of Drug Abuse about the cause of teen drug usage, peer pressure is one of the main factors of drug use. If a student will be pressured to use drugs by his/her friends, he/she can now have an easy excuse to say no to them. Also, the fact that the drug testing to various schools will be conducted randomly, fearful drug-using students will most likely stop taking drugs in order to prevent from being caught.

Some studies has shown that random drug testing actually helps in lessening the number of drug-using students. An Example of this a study conducted by National Center for Education Evaluation on 2010 entitled “The Effectiveness of Mandatory-Random Student Drug Testing.” The study reports that students taking extracurricular activities from a school that implements random drug testing had lesser percentage of drug abuse than comparable students from schools without random drug testing.

Third, random drug testing brings a sense of school safety and drug-free environment because it serves as an assurance to the parents, students and faculty that there will be lesser drug-influenced crimes that will happen inside and outside the school premises. In this way, parents will be much more willing to send their children to school, knowing that their children will not be harmed by drugs and drug-related crime.

Finally, drug test will aid in proper counseling. Drugs can cause a great risk for drug-using students to perform badly in class. If proper counseling and supervision will be performed early enough, these students would be still be able to catch up and not suffer major losses. In connection to that, the guidelines of DepEd Order No. 40 Series of 2017 have set that the drug-identified students will be turned over to the Department of Social Welfare and Development for rehabilitation and counseling. This interventions from the government will solve the problem of drug abuse among students.

In conclusion, STEC – HS believes that random drug testing is an applicable program for aiding and preventing the drug problem of the Philippines.  The order presents practical benefits that can not only greatly affect the present drug situation in the country but also in the future terms. Even if the institution’s deems the program feasible, there are still recommendation for the improvement of the program. First, this program should scrutinize the test process and the test results in order to prevent swapping of biological materials and inaccurate results, respectively. Second and the last, the government should make sure to include the rural or remote schools in the Philippines so that every student will benefit from this order.

Sea of Monsters Book Review

Book Review by: Hannah Marie Lagumbay

TITLE: The Sea of Monsters (Percy Jackson and the Olympians #2)

AUTHOR: Rick Riordan

PUBLISHER: Disney Hyperion Books

PUBLICATION DATE: April 1, 2006

GENRE: Fantasy, Greek Mythology, Adventure, Young-adult

PAGES: 279

ISBN: 0-7868-5686-6

Sea of Monsters is the second installment of the Percy Jackson and the Olympian series. This sequel of The Lightning Thief features another round of adventure for the 13 year-old Percy, as together with his friends, they sailed to the sea of monsters where they will encounter countless villains that will do their best to defeat them. This multi-awarded book presents fantasy and adventure based on the Greek mythology setting, catching the attention of not only adventure-lover readers but also to ordinary teen-ager readers as this novel touches relatable adolescent problems. The purpose of this book review is to opinionatedly assess the merits and demerits of the novel.

The novel starts with Percy, preparing for his return to Camp Half-blood. He had recurring nightmare of his lost satyr friend. He, Annabeth and his new friend, Tyson went together to the camp, only to find it infiltrated with monster. Percy is then faced with two dilemmas, finding his friend and acquiring the Golden Fleece that will protect them from monster attacks. They journeyed to the sea of monsters where they encountered many obstacles in their adventure, especially Percy’s nemesis, Luke. The book ends with a major cliff-hanger that will surely make anyone wait for its sequel.

Rick Riordan started developing the character of Percy Jackson when his son, who studies Greek mythology, requested him to create a bedtime story that combines the old characters of Greek myths with new ones thus he created Percy which he thinks, is a good idea for his new novel. The character of Percy is inspired from the struggles of his son in school because both of them are diagnosed with ADHD and dyslexia. He clarified though that his son is not the same with Percy as the character’s personality is based from his past middle-school students.

The novel strongly emphasizes relationship where Percy is always confronted with problems regarding his relationship with his mother, his father, his freak half-brother, his enemy which is Luke, Clarisse, and his unstable relationship with Annabeth. Many instances in the novel are dedicated with Percy trying his best to improve his relationship to his mother and father and also accepting the fact that he has a monster half-brother. His rocky relationship with Annabeth is also tested as they agreed to cooperate in their task to return their lost friend and to get the golden fleece.  The novel excelled in its way of making his life realistic as he faces the problems that teen-agers faces today. Even if Percy is a demi-god, he still feels insecurity and he also shows some bratty attitude from time to time. A teen-ager’s stubbornness was also represented in the novel when Percy forced to take on a journey even if it was Clarrise who is told to take the journey.

Sea of Monsters has a lot of strengths, especially in its character development. The novel also has a good plot structure where there is no dragging part in the story and the climax and resolution is well-paced. Some of the scenes are very predictable but the author included twists in the story. The twists are quite unexpected, particularly the ending where a major twist happened, changing the course of the story. These plot twists made the readers look forward as to what will happen in the next book.

In addition, the novel had also presented Greek mythology in an excellent way. Every Greek characters are introduced well and the story stayed consistent with the myth except for some minimal variations that are made in order to give way with story’s plot. Reading this novel will surely increase one’s knowledge with Greek mythology.

The novel’s weakness is its too fast pacing where most of the adventure scenes cannot be really properly visualized. Description of the scenes are not vivid enough and it was obvious that the author wanted to end the fighting scenes quickly. The failure of making this scenes vivid leads to dissatisfaction as it is clear that the plotline is good however, it cannot be fully enjoyed. Since the novel is also part of a series, it is difficult to read this novel as a stand-alone as the author expects the readers to read the first book first. The old characters were not introduced again and one will surely have a hard time in comprehending the story if the one did not read the first book. It is disappointing but can be excused as a marketing strategy.

To sum it all up, the merits of the novel outweigh its demerits. The novel is a satisfying and the weaknesses are minimal and can be easily ignored, if one will focus on its good side, it is certain that this novel will be one of the favourites. The novel is interesting especially to teens since they can find themselves in this book figuratively. The plotline, themes and writing style are commendable. This novel is recommended to adventure-lovers, mythology fans, teen-agers and even adults. This novel is a worthy read.