Part of the Kamloops District School Board’s Equity and Diversity Report is is looking to reduce the number of students who are using drugs as well as rates of smoking and vaping.

Part of the plan to do that is through the ‘Preventure Program.’ Board Chair Kathleen Karpuk says it has been piloted in other cities and has been very successful. “What it is, is allowing students to examine their own personality traits so that they have an idea of whether or not they may or may not be susceptible to some of these things and then give them the tools so that they can avoid those.” The program is going to be launched at three schools as a pilot.

The local School Board was presented with its 30 page Equity and Diversity Report at this week’s meeting. Karpuk says it doesn’t have hard data on vaping yet, but it is working on it. Despite that, she says it’s a significant issue. “We have a working group that we’ve started and we’re basically going to try and bring in all our industry partners to work on this. Vaping has been shown to be a gateway to nicotine addiction which then leaves students susceptible to other addictions as well.”

Karpuk says often times students don’t even realize that there is nicotine in the vaping products that they use. “Unfortunately, stores are able to sell vape products, they don’t have the same types of restrictions that there are for cigarettes and they’ve been marketed specifically to young adults, young teens, with the flavourings and it’s a big concern for us.”