Colorado School District Mandates Parental Consent for DARE Participation

DRUG EDUCATION February 1993

Faced by opposition from parents regarding the nature of the school-based Drug Abuse Resistance Education (DARE) antidrug program, a Colorado school district will now require parents' consent before their children are enrolled in DARE (Steve Porter, "PR-1 Takes a New Tack With Dare: Parental Consent Now Required for Antidrug Program," The Coloradoan, 1/7/93).

Under pressure from DARE opponent Gary Peterson and other parents, the Poudre R-1 public school district will now require students to submit signed parental consent forms before participating in DARE. Peterson and others said the federally funded program was in violation of the Hatch Act, requiring that such programs secure parental permission and release all instructional materials to the public for inspection. So far, the PR-1 district has refused to provide the DARE trainer's manual for inspection, Peterson said.

Peterson heads a parents group called Parents Against DARE. The mailing address is: 1805 Crestmore Place, Fort Collins, Colorado 80521. The telephone number is (303) 498-9656.