I’m all for the prevention of teen smoking, really, I am.  However, I don’t think we’re going about it the right way.  I realize the school is just complying with state law, which is awesome.  I always think it’s great when we don’t get our funding cut or Mr. Ellis doesn’t go to prison, or whatever happens to non-conforming American high schools.  Since the school is just following the recently changed state law, the law is what I’m taking issue with.

Most of the smokers at Ralston Valley probably took up the habit a year or more ago, when it was legal to possess and smoke cigarettes.  That’s right; it was those people allowing the students to have tobacco who were breaking the law.  Some kind of dream come true, right?  I mean the concept of someone else getting pegged for your deviance from the law; to be able to pursue your illegal hobbies while someone else is punished for it.  However, that’s not true anymore—I’ll get to that part in a minute.  Anyway, these kids probably started smoking before it was illegal for them to do so.  Tobacco is an addictive substance, as pretty much anyone who’s ever even glanced in the general direction of a rudimentary medical center is sure to know.  So obviously, when the law changed this didn’t mean that students would automatically stop smoking.  Not only does it take hard work to quit, but we’re talking about teenagers.  I can say with only two exceptions that I have never met a fellow teen who won’t openly defy something he or she thinks is unfair.  So when smoking itself became illegal, smokers naturally decided they would just have to stop doing it in plain sight of law enforcement—in other words, across the street.

As far as I can tell, this means students have to go farther off-campus to smoke.  They could just not-smoke if they weren’t used to being able to during the school day and, as I’ve mentioned before, probably addicted.  Describing what it’s like to abruptly stem one’s nicotine intake, one student said, “[School is] harder, it’s not as focused.”  Seanpaul Batchelder, an out-and-proud smoker, described the difference of school without a smoking pit.  “I just had to drive off-campus to smoke a cigarette,” Batchelder told me at 2:20 one blue day, having just arrived back from the trip.  Uh, class starts at 1:15, Sean.

While it probably doesn’t make all students a whole hour late, this tardiness is hardly a one-time occurrence.  Mrs. Spirk (Biology) mentioned to me that other teachers had had students arriving late to their classes; one student she claimed had spent fifteen minutes driving around the school so as to smoke without being on-campus.  Sure, the students could just not smoke, but as Batchelder mentioned, it’s hard to focus on one’s class when they’re low on chemical additives that their bodies are now accustomed to having.

An alternative solution might be to, uh, open the pit back up—yeah, you didn’t see that coming.  Obviously, the new law will assist those who haven’t taken up smoking at this point; their chances of taking up smoking in the state of Colorado have decreased drastically.  However, those who already smoke are just getting hurt academically either by being unable to focus or by missing class.  It’s not like the new law was a high priority—it was first passed in October of 2008, but not implemented until August of 2009.  Why?  To save money on printing new Student Conduct Codes.  I know the smoking pit’s “closing” is actually the lack of students idiotic enough to smoke where a police officer might spot him or her rather than the school’s measures to halt smoking by minors; therefore, I guess I’m addressing the state legislature when I say this is the opposite of helpful.

Some people may feel that if the closing of the pit causes at least one student to quit smoking, that’s enough.  Well that’s fantastic, good for you.  Seriously, I’m happy for you.  However, in 2005 it was recorded that 23% of high school students admitted to smoking a cigarette within the last month.  At RV, that leaves approximately 68.7 student smokers to struggle with a dependency, not to mention they are more likely than not to be late or unfocused, deteriorating their academic ability and lessening their chances at a decent career.  That’s almost 70 kids living out of their parents’ basement, working the graveyard shift at the convenience store-slash-gas station on the corner.

Anyway, congratulations to that metaphorical solitary student.