Cannabis On Campus - The Growing Prevalence Of Marijuana In K-12 Schools - Part 1

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Episode Transcript

(00:01):
From the W A and M Studioon the campus of Florida A and M
University. This is Mariform Radio,a weekly conversation on the education and research
of medical marijuana being conducted at musHi. I'm Heidi Otway. You're host
for this Conversations on Cannabis Virtual Form, brought to you by the Medical Marijuana
Education and Research Initiative at Florida andM University. In this conversation, we're

(00:25):
talking about cannabis use in K throughtwelve schools. So let's talk and learn
about this subject with our guests Tamorrow. Tamara Pryor is a holistic cannabis nurse,
educator and health coach who has spentnearly two decades as a school nurse
for students in grades nine through twelvein the state of Illinois. Nurse Pryor

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is a member of the American HolisticNurses Association and a recognized expert in cannabis,
nutrition, wellness, and holistic healing. She completed the Medical Cannabis Institutes
Medical Cannabis Curriculum for Nurse's Course andrecently attain her certification as a Cannabis and
Health Coach Nurse. Prior Welcome tothe forum. We're glad to have you,

(01:11):
thank you for the introduction him sohappy to be here. Thank you.
Our other guests is Canine Sergeant KyleJohnson with the Taylor County Sheriff's Office.
He currently serves as a school Resourceofficer at Taylor County High School.
He's worked in law enforcement for morethan a decade and has experienced serving on
a drug task force in North Florida. Sergeant Johnson, Welcome to the forum.

(01:34):
Good morning, Thank you. Thankyou to everyone joining us on this
live program. Please share posts andtag a friend on Facebook to have them
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your questions in the comment box andwe'll do our best to have our guests

(01:56):
answer them. We also want youto tell us what you think about the
form by completing the survey that willbe posted in the comments on YouTube and
Facebook. After the live program,your name will be entered into a drawing
on September seven, twenty twenty threeto win a one hundred dollars gift card
provided by one of Mary's partners.Now, let's start this conversation on cannabis.

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So, after medical cannabis was acrew for use in Florida, the
state or school districts to create theirown guidelines that allow students with medical marijuana
cards to use the product on campusduring school hours. It's been a few
years since the first policies were createdand it appears that not all school districts
have guidelines. So Officer John said, I'm going to start with you.

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Does Taylor County schools and those innearby counties have policies. I'm not sure
on the nearby counties, but theones in Taylor County do not. We
do not have a policy on thatyet. Okay, So what's allowed on
campus? Zero nine? Okay,good to know, nurse prior. You're
based in Illinois, what are thelaws there when it comes to allowing students

(03:05):
to use medical cannabis on campus?And so, if the student is going
to use medical uh A marijuana oncampus, they have to have a they
have to be certified patients. Sothey have to have two certifications signed by
a recommending position and a reviewing physician. And then once they have been approved,

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once they receive that, they canthen receive their medical Cannabis card.
They have to have either they haveto have caregiver. They can have up
to three. They can be aparent, guardian or uh some other caregiver
that is an adult of course.And then once they receive that, they

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have to present all of that tothe school district, to the school whichever
building that they're in. And nowwe school district does have to adopt a
policy or administering cannabis before that cannabiscan be brought on campus. So all

(04:11):
of those things have to be onin place. They have to have a
medical cannabis car. But the schooldistrict also has to have a policy and
in addition to that, the parentsand the position has to complete what we
call a medication authorization form that hasto be on file also with the school.
Interesting, So, nurse prim what'sthe process for a kid to take

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their non smokable, non inhalable productssuch as oils, teachers, or lotions
during the school hours? Okay,so in my building or in my district,
at this point, we do nothave a policy. We are currently
working on a policy. But oncethe policy is in place, the student

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the parent has to submit the medicationauthorization form it's like a doctor's order basically.
And then they all also have topresent the child's medical cannabis card and
it has to display you know,it's going to display their their name and
all their information. And and oncethey submit that, it can be administered

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by either a nurse or administrator whohas taken the Illinois Department of Public Health
training. It's an annual training thatthey must take before they can administer to
the student. That's really interesting.So how do you do you have to
keep the product, the cannabis productsseparate from let's say, other medications that

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students may be allowed to take oncampus that are like, you know,
traditional medications. Yes, and thathas to actually be included in the policy
that's created. Where is it goingto be stored. It cannot be in
our traditional medication cabinet. That's thatare you know, those medications are locked
up as well. But it hasto has its step, it has to

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has it has to have its ownmedical medication cabinet just for those products.
Well, Locke, it can onlybe accessible by the nurse and or administrator
that has been trained. Yeah,now I have a question because we don't
we don't have a policy here andwe eventually I'll have to write one does

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the kid take it home every day? Or do they leave it? They
leave it? They leave it,okay, they leave it okay, and
it remains in that locked cabinet.I got you, okay. Yeah,
And I wanted to say for allof our listeners and viewers that are in
Florida, I would recommend that yougo to your school district because they will
have their policies posted and you canalso talk to the school nurses and they

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can let you know what the policiesare for your specific school district. In
the state of Florida. As ourreference earlier, we have some school districts
that do have policies and guidelines andsome that don't. So I would recommend
that you do that. So let'sswitch gears a little bit and talk a
little bit about We know that everyschool district is different in every state is
different when it comes to medical cannabisuse. But I think that, you

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know, we really should kind ofdive in a little bit about cannabis being
on campus in general. And soSergeant Coyl, I'm going to kind of
go to you to talk about,you know, as a school resource officer.
What are you seeing when it comesto cannabis on school campuses? And
I'm talking about the adult use illegalform of cannabis here in Florida. For

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the adult use, I don't,I don't. I don't know that we
have any issues for the adult usedpart on it. For the juvenile yeah,
where kids are bringing it on campusor using it. Right, We've
had a couple of incidents of kidsbringing it on campus. We spoke the
other day about it was medicinal marijuanathat they actually had gotten from their grandpa.

(07:57):
Having kids bring medicinal Canada, it'smaking it very easily accessible to them
now if they know where it's atin the home or if their grandparents have
it and they know where grandparents keepit. That's actually the case that came
in through our investigation. It actuallycame through grandpas. And just like that,

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you know, we follow the investigationand you go ahead and you charge
it accordingly. As far as justthe recreational uses coming on to campus,
knock on Wood, we haven't hadtoo much of that, and I think
it's largely in Part two. I'vebeen K nine officer for so many years
and I actually have a dog thatcomes to campus with me multiple days a

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week that we walk through classrooms,parking lots, teachers parking lot, visiting
parking lot, student parking lot.We walcome through it all and it's a
random deal. They don't ever knowwhenever. We just decide, hey,
we're fixing to go clear class andwalk a dog, you know. So
I think that has greatly deterred ouruse of marijuana on campus. So then

(09:05):
my thought it would be what happensif the dog smells something. If he
smells something, we treat it justlike we would if we were on the
street. If it's a vehicle,we get the owner of the vehicle,
We get the parent on the phone. The parents have come up here.
We've shown them exactly what we foundout of the vehicles. The kids know
we're kind of a small town,so they kind of see us work in

(09:26):
the streets already, so they kindof know the process of it. So
we just you know, we letthe school decide and we we we go
ahead and follow it through the law. Yeah, what are some examples of
where you all actually found a kidwho had cornt of us? And what
was the outcome of that. Sowe actually had a senior a couple of

(09:48):
years ago that we've done a vehiclewalk in the parking lot and we found
some you know, misdemeanor amount marijuana. At that point, he was fixing
to graduate, hoping to go tocollege. So I let this. I
took my discretionary tactics on that.I let the school handle the discipline action

(10:09):
on it without filing charges on him. And a matter of fact, he
came back about a year later andhugged my neck that he actually went on
to college and he was able topursue his degree without having any trouble because
of that. He paid his consequence, you know, he paid his punishment
through the school on his consequences andwe were able to move on and getting
corrected. Yeah. So, nurseprior, you've had decades of experience in

(10:33):
the schools. Have you experience orbeen called into action if a student has
been perceived to be high or hasproduct on them? Yes, I have.
So if they suspect that a studentis high, they called me down,

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and I when I when I whenI go in, I let the
student know that I'm not there forfor discipline. That's not my role.
And my role is to make surethat they are safe and that they don't
need further medical care. And soI my role is to do an assessment
on the student. I'm checking theirvital signs. I am just making sure

(11:20):
that they are they just don't needfurther medical care. That's my role.
And then any examples of where youmay have seen a student you know you
knew something was wrong, yes,you usually so. Typically one of the
first tell tale signs is that theirheart rate is really high. If they're

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h if I know that they're baselinebased on maybe physical or them being in
my office previous times. And thensometimes we have to check with the parents
to see if that you know whattheir baseline is. But usually the telltale
sign is that their heart rate isreally high. We have also had students
that are their behavior is very unusual. Maybe they're extremely hyper, or maybe

(12:05):
they're paranoid. And sometimes they're vombingbecause because the THHC that was in the
product was just so high it makesthem vomit. Wow. Wow. So
in what great levels do you allsee the most cannabis use among students within
those schools. Within a school,it varies, I'm gonna say it starts

(12:28):
here at the middle school level.Wow, tell me about that. Well,
you know, I made a phonecall the other day and was talking
to the resource officer at middle schooland they told me that in the last
couple of years they've had ten tofifteen cases of marijuana that's actually been called
on campus. And that's what isthat sixth seventh eighth grade. So it's

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starting at a at a young age. And there's prior. We were talking
earlier and you said that sometimes youjust assess the kids. Why. Yeah,
and that's true. When I goin there after I've done my assessment,
that's, you know, really whatI want to know. Once I

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know that they're okay, what isthere why? There's a reason that they
are illegally using cannabis. There's areason that they're not going to their parents
and talking to them about them theiruse or thinking about using or wanting to
use cannabis. There's a why behindit, and so I want to know

(13:37):
the why so that I can helpthem further, So that so our social
workers and our counselors can't help themfurther, because there usually is a why.
And from your experience, what haveyou heard the why? Why?
Loss of loved ones sometimes some studentsare really stressed about their classes. Sometimes

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there may be some abuse going onin the home, and so those are
the wise that some of the studentshave shared. Yeah, Sergeant Kyle,
what about you when you encounter someof these kids and you kind of inquire,
you know, what's the situation?Have you need to Yeah, the

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same thing she just said. Ihave heard lots of loved ones. I've
heard anxiety, and then I've justheard the that's just what we do,
you know, So you know,it's it's a pure recreational thing. So
I've kind of heard the whole gamutof it, you know. Yeah,
So let's talk about the impact ofcannabis use on young people, and there's

(14:41):
prior I'm going to kind of leanon you on this one about you know,
what are the health concerns and healthrisks of young people using cannabis recreationally.
I don't use Well, first ofall, they have no idea what
they're doing, most of them.I mean, that's just really that's they
have no idea what they're doing.Their brains are still developing. We have

(15:03):
a lot of research actually that isout there, although a lot of people
don't believe that we have and youknow, very much research, but there
is a lot of research that's outthere, but there's still is a lot
of research that needs to be donebecause we don't know how that it can
impact their brains because they are it'sthey're still developing, and so that you

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know, then there's of course afall risk that can injure themselves because they
don't know what they're doing. Theydon't know what's in the product. They
don't know how much THHC would that'sthe compounds of the cannabis plant that gets
you high. They don't know howmuch is in the product that they're consuming.
And then I've also found that alot of our students are using the

(15:50):
the the vapes, the oil vapes, and first and foremost for you know,
for me as a nurse, ailand lungs don't mix, so that's
an issue. And then where arethey getting it. These products aren't being
tested, they're not being tested forheavy metals and pesticides and molds or other

(16:12):
drugs, right right, No,they don't know where, they don't know
what's in it, and it's it'snot regulated in any way, and so
it can be very harmful, youknow. So that's the concern. Those
are the health concerns. Yeah,Sargeka, did you want to add to

(16:33):
that? I think she hit mostof it. But yeah, the and
and I'm even gonna step just onestep further with the with the synthetic cannabis
that is out there now and themakeup on it. I mean it changes
just so you know, so youcan't you know, you have to send
it off to have it, haveit tested, to even know what what

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is in it, to know howto even charge it, you know,
so you know, they don't theydon't have a clue when it's getting mixed
up and what's being sprayed on it, and you know, to affect the
high that they're getting. You know, some highs just ain't good enough,
so they want to they want tospray a little bit, add a little
bit to it. And so,yes, it is. It is a

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true concern on what they're actually puttingin their body. Yeah. So you
know, I want to talk aboutedibles, and we did. We had
someone come on and talk about inSouth Florida, it is common they're commonly
seeing ice cream trucks or what lookslike ice cream trucks that are selling cannabis

(17:36):
products, you know, the CBDsand the delta as and such, and
it looks like candy. You know, it's the gummy bears, it's the
lollipops, it's the brownies and thecookies. Let's talk about that and what
you all are seeing in the schoolswith young students using those. Uh,
Sergeant Kai, you want to takethat on? Yeah, I can.
I can take that. So we'veactually addressed just that situation of outside food

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and beverage coming on to campus.Mostly the food if it's not an ordered
lunch or something like that from areputable restaurant or something like that. But
if it's homemade stuff, we havecut it out. We don't we're not
allowed. You're not allowed to bringany more homemade unless it is for a
party and it has been approved throughthe administration. You're not allowed to bring

(18:25):
it on the campus anymore. Well, what prompted that decision just there was
some concerns that was coming in withsome candy that we were seeing, and
we've done some talking, We've donesome investigations on it and found out that
it was actually a legit homemade candythat was being made. But it we
I felt like that it was openingthe door for us to run into the

(18:48):
edibles being brought on campus and disguisedas as normal snacks or food. Interesting,
Nurse Prior, what about your experience? So I just would like to
ask Officer Kyle, you mentioned thatyou shut down the candy or you know,
the homemade products that come on campus. Are you speaking of you said

(19:10):
anything that's outside of a party orsomething that the kids are bringing in for
the you know, and their lunch. Can you no what I'm talking about?
We had a group of we hadwe had some kids that would bring
brownies, they'd bring candy in andthey would just share it with their friends.
So it's it's that type of stuff. If you bring it in your
lunch, that's one thing. We'renot searching lunch boxes obviously, and if

(19:32):
it's an outside food source, we'renot going through your your meal. But
if you're bringing it in and it'sin a bag and you're just passing it
around to your friends, that that'swhat we're cutting out now, got it?
Clarification, What we normally see,what I normally see in our building
are the gummies. Gummies are atThey're a hot thing because it looks like

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normal candy, you know, itlooks like a gummy bear or a gummy
worm. So and then what whathow do you? What do you?
What happens? If you see that? You see that? What happens?
Do you bring in the school resourceofficer or the what does the teacher do?
So if this child is displaying unusualbehavior in the classroom, we have
but we have an emergency button thatthey can push that's on the wall,

(20:15):
or we have a hotline helpline ratherthat they can call to get an administrator
into their classroom to remove the childand take the child down to the dean's
office and then it's investigated further.There has been instances where the child was
not able to be removed from theclassroom right away because they just didn't look

(20:38):
well. They were maybe they werevomiting, or their behavior was quite unusual.
So I'm I was called down inthose cases, I'm called down to
assess the student in the classroom tomake sure that they're safe in it.
The EMS service does not need tobe contacted, So make sure that nine
one one does not need to becalled. And then if they are,

(21:02):
if a student is healthy, they'resafe, then the deans and the resource
officers take over from there. So, Sargeant Johnson, do you all do
drug testing of kids? We donot, but our district actually has a
policy and if we suspect one,we can have them, we can have
them drug tested. And that well, and that's that's for the athletes that

(21:26):
actually sign the waiver that they canbe drug tested if they're if they're not,
if they haven't signed that paperwork,we contact the parents. We let
the parents know, and we've hada really good response with our parents that
are not they're not supportive of thebad habits, so they will have them
drug tested on their own. Sons. Good, thank you, Thank you.

(21:51):
Start to Kyle, So nurs Parmemight be a good time for you
to kind of educate our listeners andviewers about the indocannabinoids system and how cannabis
affects that, especially when we're talkingabout young people, and also a little
bit about dosing, because when youthink of the gummies, you know,
it takes a while for that feelingto happen. So can you talk a

(22:14):
little bit about that from from themedical side. Okay, yeah, sure.
So the endocannabinoid system is the mastercontrol system of all of our other
systems and our body. And soif our endocannabinoid system is out of balance,
then they're gonna be other things thatare out of balance. And so
if you know something is going onthat's out of balancing your body, then

(22:38):
your endocabinoid system is out of balance. And so I wanted to just kind
of step back just a second aboutjust for a moment, about the testing.
So let's say you know, theythe child is saying on that day

(22:59):
they did not consume, right,But the parent takes the child to go
get tested on that day to thedoctor to see if the child is lying
about consuming on that day. Thetest that we have it tests for a
byproduct of TC, which can lastin the body anywhere from five days to
thirty days or beyond thirty days,depending on the person. So it could

(23:22):
be that maybe that child did consumemaybe four days ago and actually was being
honest about not consuming on that day, and so some of the testing to
find out if they were high onthat day is not reliable. So so
I just wanted to add that partof it because we have had parents day.

(23:44):
I'm gonna take you today, youknow, to see if you really
did consume today, So Sergeant Johnsonand Nurse Prayer thank you for being our
guests on this Conversation's on Cannabis virtualform brought to you by the Medical Marijuana
Education and Research Initiative at Florida andM University. Thank you to everyone that's
watching this program. Tell us whatyou think about this form by completing the
survey that will be posted in thecomment boxes on YouTube and Facebook after this

(24:10):
live program you can complete. Ifyou complete the survey, your name will
be entered into a drawing on Septemberseven, twenty twenty three, to win
a one hundred dollars gift card providedby one of Mary's partners. We also
want to encourage you to go tothe Florida Department of Health Office of Medical
Marijuana Use website to learn how toobtain a legal medical marijuana card in the

(24:30):
state of Florida. We also encourageyou to go to Florida and M University's
Mary website to learn more about thisinitiatives, educational programs, and additional information
about cannabis use in Florida. Thankseveryone. The views and opinions of our
invited guests are not necessarily the viewsand opinions are Florida Agricultural and Mechanical University

(24:53):
or the Medical Marijuana Education and ResearchInitiative