Our view: Detectors a useful tool in curbing student vaping

Published 3:00 pm Friday, November 24, 2023

The distinctive, and pervasive, odor of cigarette smoke makes it difficult for students to get away with smoking at school.

Vaping, unfortunately, is rather easier to conceal, as it produces a less cloying vapor.

But, like smoking, vaping is illegal for people younger than 21. And both involve nicotine, which can harm developing brains.

Given the stakes, it’s gratifying to learn that officials at many school districts in the region are deploying, or plan to use, technology to combat vaping in schools.

As EO Media Group reported in the Nov. 18 issue of our new Saturday regional issue, officials have installed vape detectors in restrooms at many schools.

Some schools have placed detectors that can alert officials not only to vaping but also to illicit use of THC, the psychoactive compound in marijuana.

The need for such surveillance is borne out by statistics.

A report from the Oregon Health Authority in October 2019, based on surveys the agency conducted, found that the percentage of high school juniors in Oregon who vaped had risen from 13% in 2017 to 23% in 2019.

Among juniors who use marijuana, more were vaping the drug, as opposed to smoking it, according to the same survey. In 2017, among juniors who reported using marijuana, just 11% vaped. In 2019, the figure was 44%.

The detectors have paid rapid dividends in some schools.

At Pendleton’s Sunridge Middle School and Pendleton High School, where 10 detectors were installed this year at each school, the detectors were busy early in the school year. So were administrators, who handed out a lot of one-day suspensions to students, said Kevin Headings, Pendleton School District superintendent.

But after the first month of classes the situation changed dramatically, Headings said, with just two suspensions for vaping during October.

At La Grande Middle School, officials caught 21 students for vaping in 2021-22, the first year detectors were in place. That figure dropped to 29 in last school year, and through the first two months or so of the current school year only one student had been caught, principal Chris Wagner said.

Detectors aren’t the only plausible method to discourage students from vaping, to be sure.

Sara Hayes, principal at Wallowa middle and high schools, attributes a dramatic decrease in vaping this year in part to a prevention campaign that includes more mental health support for students, and separating middle and high school students.

In the Hermiston School District, the largest in the region, administrators have chosen to focus on educating students and parents about the dangers of vaping rather than installing detectors, said Dan Greenough, the district’s director of student services.

Ideally, detectors would be superfluous.

But with the growing prevalence of vaping among teenagers, it’s encouraging that school officials have tools that have proved to be effective at curbing vaping inside school walls.