Like almost all high schools across the country, Camas High School (CHS) has a vaping issue. As a way to combat the current vaping epidemic that most high schools face, CHS has installed vape sensors. These sensors are highly sensitive and detect certain things such as carbon dioxide levels, nitrogen dioxide levels, air quality, health index, temperature, the specific type of smoke and any tampering with the device.
CHS Associate Principal for 11th Grade, Owen Sanford explained why this technology was implemented only as recently as this year.
“They were not as widely available, and they were not as affordable before. I do not think they are cheap but I think they have been mass produced enough where we are able to get them,” Sanford said.
Technology plays a massive role in today’s society, vape sensors are one of the many things schools are doing now to prevent drug use among teenagers. Although they are becoming more and more common within schools, people really do not know the effectiveness of vape sensors.
“We obviously are not [catching every kid who vapes], but we have gotten so many. That first week, when we put the sensors in, it was [really quick],” CHS Principal Kelly O’Rourke said. “[It is] kind of horrible at one point because you are thinking ‘Really? there are that many kids?’”
With the implication of the vape sensors in the CHS bathrooms, the process to catch people vaping seems simple but is actually a very intricate process.
“Anytime we have a sensor go off, it gets emailed to a lot of different staff members to notify them,” Sanford said. “Anyone in the bathroom at the time [of the alert] gets called down and [we] have a conversation with them, [followed by] the pocket search and backpack search as well as metal detectors and everything.”
“Once that happens, if they have a vape on them we follow the proper school protocols,” Sanford said.
The drug the student is caught with determines the punishment and the following steps for that student. Nicotine is a one day out of school suspension whereas Marijuana is a three day out of school suspension. Both instances include drug counseling.
Drugs have been a fad within school walls more and more in recent years, and even though schools across the U.S have taken steps to try and stop kids from doing drugs it is very hard to catch every kid. Among kids just taking drugs, drug dealers and deals have become more common as well.
“For me as a principal, I think where my hard line is, is [at] drug dealers. I was like that in Vegas, I have zero tolerance. Not that I want kids getting high, but I can take that better than if the kids are actually distributing drugs, I have no tolerance for that,” O’Rourke said.
The steps that CHS has taken to deal with the vaping epidemic that has impacted schools across the US since their creation have paid off. The sheer amount of students caught from the sensors have shown that they work. It is also important to recognize that with drug deals that can happen in high schools you never truly know what you are getting. It can look like one substance and actually be something completely different and potentially much more dangerous.
