| Do you believe if more kids attended school, | | | | of all vice and immorality." Henry Fielding |
| there would be less crime? Studying the | | | | lived from 1707 to 1754. |
| relationship between school attendance and | | | | |
| crime goes back more than 200 years. Many | | | | Others wonder if crime is closely related to |
| people believe that better crime control | | | | drug use. A study entitled, "The Monitoring |
| measures should involve vigorous police work, | | | | the Future Study" asked high school seniors |
| or strict law enforcement. | | | | this question in 2006: "On how many |
| | | | occasions, if any, have you used drugs or |
| For thousands of years and long before the | | | | alcohol over the last twelve months?" |
| mandatory school attendance, crime has | | | | |
| prevailed. Violence and even references to | | | | Here are the answers: |
| youth gangs are all refferenced in the Holy | | | | |
| Bible. | | | | Alcohol - 66.5 |
| | | | |
| American's views about education and crime | | | | Marijuana 31.5 |
| were referenced in a January 10, 1931 | | | | |
| Literary Digest, article entitled "What We | | | | Other opiates - 9.0 |
| Shall Be Like in 1950.". The article | | | | |
| mentioned prophecies made by the National | | | | Stimulants - 8.1 |
| Education Association adapted from a | | | | |
| publication called Tomorrow's Business, which | | | | Sedatives - 6.6 |
| said, "Crime will be virtually abolished by | | | | |
| transferring to the preventive processes of | | | | Tranquilizers - 6.6 |
| the school and education the problems of | | | | |
| conduct which police, courts, and prisons now | | | | Cocaine - 5.7 |
| remedy when it is too late." | | | | |
| | | | Hallucinogens - 4.9 |
| One student drops out every 26 seconds in | | | | |
| America. One Harvard study found that black | | | | Inhalants - 4.5 |
| students fall behind by the time they are | | | | |
| three years old. Three of the one million New | | | | Steroids - 1.8 |
| York students are a minority, with 70 percent | | | | |
| impoverished. | | | | Heroin - 0.8 |
| | | | |
| Many experts believe school causes crime more | | | | Today there are numerous programs nationwide |
| than it prevents it, and this is not | | | | that help prevent both drug use and crime, |
| necessarily a new belief. Henry Fielding said | | | | and they have also helped students do better |
| in his day, "Public schools are the nurseries | | | | in school. |