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Since 1991, the La Grange Police Department has partnered with D.A.R.E. (Drug Abuse Resistance Education) America to bring local school children a program designed to address the current issues faced by today's students. D.A.R.E. is a program designed to teach young people ways to resist peer pressure to experiment with drugs, alcohol and join gangs. Officers work with young people when they are most vulnerable to tremendous peer pressure and teach them the skills to make positive decisions and avoid negative behaviors. Currently, D.A.R.E. is taught in more than 300,000 classrooms in all 50 states and 43 countries around the world. Over 36 million Kindergarten to 12th grade students are positively impacted by D.A.R.E. each year. The D.A.R.E. program is taught by veteran police officers who have direct experience with criminals whose lives have been ruined by substance abuse. Each police officer who teaches the D.A.R.E. program completes an 80-hour training course which includes instruction in teaching techniques, officer-school relationships, development of self-esteem, child development and communication skills. The D.A.R.E. curriculum helps students recognize and successfully manage stress, evaluate risk-taking behaviors, resist gang pressure, apply effective decision-making skills, and evaluate the consequences of the choices available to them. Since its beginning, the D.A.R.E. program has achieved outstanding success teaching positive and effective approaches to some of the most difficult problems facing our young people today - substance abuse, violence and gangs.
STATEMENT ON STUDENT CONFIDENTIAL DISCLOSURE When students begin the D.A.R.E. program they are advised by their instructor not to talk about their parents, relatives or friends in the class room. Because D.A.R.E. officers are teachers, they follow the same local school district guidelines as any school employee. On the rare occasion when a student approaches a D.A.R.E. officer and advises him or her of a dangerous situation, the officer, like a schoolteacher or principal, is required by law to report this disclosure. 
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