JANE KELLEY was thinking about Ritalin and keyed into cyberspace:
JK>MP>JK>MP>Schools should not diagnose. They should teach.
JK>MP>JK>Our schools aren't doing a decent job of either one these days,
JK>MP>JK>according to what I see on TV.  We need to overhaul the entire
JK>MP>JK>school system.
JK>MP>On that, you'll get no argument from me.
JK>I want the full amount that the taxpayers make available to the
JK>public schools made available to each parent to take where they
JK>choose.  I saw where one district spent around $9,000 a year on kids
JK>once, that was just over twice what we were spending at the time on
JK>one of the better private schools in Seattle!
JK>The cost to the taxpayers might actually go down with good charter
JK>schools competing with lousy public ones.
Charter and private schools do not have the "burden" of providing 
adequate special education. COmparing them is like comparing apples and 
sirloin.
JK>MP>High school students prefer marijuana. Ritalin does not give a
JK>MP>good "high".
JK>That is like saying since our first drug of choice in this nation
JK>ever since the days when the Mayflower was on the high seas has been
JK>beverage alcohol, we really don't have to worry very much about
JK>cocaine and Heroin.
JK>Which is stupid.
High school students prefer an easy high. I recently met the regional 
drug ed coordinator and ran a few of those "Janeisms" by him. He did 
point out that no case of MPH abuse has been reported in this area for 
three years (and that is how long he is on this job).
JK>MP>JK>In very few cases.  The long term effects of that drug are just
JK>MP>JK>beginning to be known to be very harmful.  I would not want any
JK>MP>JK>child I know to be on it without the blessing of the
JK>MP>JK>neurologists associated with the University of Washington.
JK>MP>In most cases where MPH is used, the child does have a far more
JK>MP>successful life than if it were not used.
JK>Not is that child is being drugged at the behest of some school for
JK>what is called "administrative convenience". Remember these are the
JK>bright kids that get bored easily that the schools are having a
JK>problem with these days, not the ones who sit quietly and don't
JK>complain. 
This is getting real tired. Schools may mention medications, but they 
cannot force them.
ADHD kids are not kids that bored easily.
JK> MP>As for the long term effects, could you cite them? Can you
JK> MP>provide supporting epidemiological studies to show that the "long
JK>term  effects" MP>are not just someone's vivid imagination?
JK>Have a friend named Richard Embom who is a certified drug and alcohol
JK>counselor, has a degree in chemistry  of some kind, and can give you
JK>all kinds of information on this drug when it is abused.  Want to
JK>write to him?  Send me an email message where I can send back his
JK>address and you can do just that.
Does he have an email address? A degree in chemistry? Not bad. Mine are 
in microbiology and biochemistry.
               The Few. The Proud. The Chosen.
                     markprobe@aol.com
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