Drug abuse is becoming a bigger and ever evolving issue in today’s world but how close is it actually? Some think it is closer than it actually is since in today’s world social media and word of mouth has that affect. After asking PN students a lot of questions to see how big of a problem it is and how they think it is affecting the lives of others, I heard a lot of interesting opinions and thoughts.

The first thing to cover is the amount of drugs here at Northern. “Obviously there are drugs here, I just don’t see them around me and around the school in general”, says Trevor Towghi (10). This lack of seeing drugs around school is a good thing because many people aren’t lucky enough to have drugs stay away from them.

Some children grow up with parents that are addicted to drugs and this is both a good and bad thing, although the negatives outweigh the positives. “I think when a parent is addicted, the kids see how it affects the parents and that has a large effect of whether  or not they end up trying drugs. If the parent makes it seem cool and fun, the kids are most likely going to try it, but if the kids see it mess up the lives of their parents, they will probably steer clear of them,” says Clark Cummings (10). People get addicted and either arrested or expelled for possession of them. And in families where the parents do drugs, their kids are more likely to have a hard time in school.

Overall, drugs aren’t a huge problem at Portage Northern. “I think the environment here just doesn’t generally support drugs,” says Towghi. This is a good thing because it means fewer people will receive the negative effects that drugs have on people’s lives.