The four local school boards have opted out of presenting the DARE program in their classrooms, so Timmins Police have also bowed out. However, that doesn’t mean the end of the program in the city.
The Dare Timmins board is staying, and so is coordinator Rick Lemieux.
“So even though the partnership with the Timmins Police Service and the school boards is done,” he remarks, “we’re still going to be very involved in the community, trying to help as many kids as we can.”
The first activity will be offering the Define, Assess, Respond, Evaluate program to Grade 6 and 7 students in the evening.
Because it used to be Drug and Alcohol Resistance Education, Lemieux says some people think it deals with mostly drugs and booze. But only one of the lessons deals with that.
“The other lessons,” Lemieux outlines, “we talk about how to deal with stress, how to deal with peer pressure, how to communicate confidently, bullying, being a good citizen and then we end it with getting help.”
All the DARE activities are outlined on the DARE Timmins website.
Proceeds of the sale of Smile cookies at Tim Hortons next month will be split between the Timmins and OPP programs.