Editing Narconon (section)

==Education program==

===Florida===
In 1999, Scientologists from [[Clearwater, Florida|Clearwater]], [[Florida]], tried to get a Narconon drug education program instituted into the [[Pinellas County, Florida|Pinellas County]] school district curriculum. After a hearing on the matter, a school district committee refused to allow students to participate in an anti-drug program based on Hubbard's teachings, citing that teaching students about the "[[Emotional tone scale|tone scale]]" and other trappings of Scientology was inappropriate for a drug education program for their schools.<ref>{{cite news |first=Shelby |last=Oppel |url=https://pqasb.pqarchiver.com/sptimes/access/40514106.html?dids=40514106:40514106&FMT=FT&FMTS=ABS:FT&date=Apr+13%2C+1999&author=SHELBY+OPPEL&pub=St.+Petersburg+Times&edition=&startpage=1& |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20071001044740/https://pqasb.pqarchiver.com/sptimes/access/40514106.html?dids=40514106:40514106&FMT=FT&FMTS=ABS:FT&date=Apr+13%2C+1999&author=SHELBY+OPPEL&pub=St.+Petersburg+Times&edition=&startpage=1& |archive-date=October 1, 2007 |title=School panel rejects anti-drug program |newspaper=[[St. Petersburg Times]] |date=13 April 1999}}</ref>

===California===
In 2004, Narconon offered an anti-drug program to public schools in California, free of charge. However, a series of articles in the ''San Francisco Chronicle'' in June 2004, resulted in California school officials investigating Narconon's claims. The study found that Narconon's program did not reflect medically and scientifically based practices and that it offered students misleading information about drug use and abuse.<ref name=EW>{{cite journal |last= Cavanagh|first=Sean |date=2 March 2005|title=California Chief Warns Schools About Anti-Drug Program |journal=[[Education Week]] |volume=24 |issue=25 |pages=4 |url=http://www.edweek.org/ew/articles/2005/03/02/25brief-3.h24.html |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160512232549/http://www.edweek.org/ew/articles/2005/03/02/25brief-3.h24.html |archive-date=12 May 2016}}</ref> As a result of the investigation, on 23 February 2005, the state's superintendent of public instruction, Jack O'Connell, officially recommended that all schools in the state reject the Narconon program.<ref>[http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?file=/c/a/2005/02/23/MNGQJBFKV81.DTL "Schools urged to drop antidrug program"], ''The San Francisco Chronicle'', 23 February 2005. Retrieved 4 June 2006.</ref> O'Connell's secretary announced that the school systems in Los Angeles and [[San Francisco]] had dropped the program. The president of Narconon, Clark Carr, responded that the study presented only limited information about his organization's work, and that those efforts were "accurate and relevant to the current challenges children face with drugs."<ref name=EW/>

A May 2014 investigation by the ''Chronicle'' discovered that some California schools were still using the Narconon program, in spite of the 2004 decision. Steve Heilig, one of the experts who evaluated the Narconon education program on behalf of the school district and found it to be scientifically unsound,<ref>{{cite news|last=Roberts|first=Chris|title=Bay Area Schools Hoodwinked by Scientology-Related Anti-Drug Program|url=http://www.nbcbayarea.com/news/local/Bay-Area-Schools-Hoodwinked-by-Scientology-Related-Drug--260707261.html|access-date=27 May 2014|newspaper=NBC Bay Area|date=26 May 2014}}</ref> urged schools to check the accreditation of drug education programs before allowing them access to students, saying, "One imperative of drug education is that we not deceive students, as once they discover that you are not telling them factual information, they are likely to disbelieve everything you say".<ref>{{cite news|last=Asimov|first=Nanette|title=Narconon: Misleading antidrug program back in public schools|url=http://www.sfgate.com/education/article/Narconon-Misleading-antidrug-program-back-in-5504351.php|access-date=26 May 2014|newspaper=San Francisco Chronicle|date=25 May 2014}}</ref>

===United Kingdom===
The UK prisons [[ombudsman]] recommended to prison governors that Narconon rehabilitation programs not be used in prisons although some schools in the UK are using these programs; ''[[The Sunday Times (UK)|The Sunday Times]]'' said this was because schools are less aware of Narconon's links to Scientology.<ref>{{cite news | title = Revealed: how Scientologists infiltrated Britain's schools | newspaper = [[The Sunday Times (UK)]] | date = 7 January 2007 | url = http://www.timesonline.co.uk/article/0,,2087-2535187.html | archive-url = https://archive.today/20090511233906/http://www.timesonline.co.uk/article/0,,2087-2535187.html | url-status = dead | archive-date = May 11, 2009 | access-date =7 January 2007 | location=London | first=Leo | last=Lewis}}</ref> In September 2012, the 149 [[Church of England]] schools in the Diocese of London were warned not to accept offers from Narconon to give lectures to their pupils, following complaints from parents.<ref>{{cite web | title = Schools alert on drugs group | work = [[Church Times]] | date = 10 August 2012 | url = http://www.churchtimes.co.uk/articles/2012/10-august/news/uk/schools-alert-on-drugs-group | access-date =17 August 2012}}</ref>

In November 2016, Narconon was reported to have given talks on the dangers of drug addiction in two schools in [[Camden, London]]. Elizabeth Kitcatt, Camden School for Girls headteacher, said in a statement that the students found the talk "very useful", while Harry Shapiro, Director of DrugWise, called out the schools for being unaware to the group's ties to Scientology. A Brecknock Primary spokeswoman said: "The school's deputy head was in the room for the whole drug awareness talk and at no point was there any mention of Scientology or any religious connotations. It was marketed as an anti-drug talk and that's exactly what it was". President of Narconon UK Noel Nile claimed that the group was "in the business of saving lives".<ref>{{Cite web |url=http://www.camdennewjournal.com/camden-schools-drug-talks |title=Charity with Scientology links gives anti-drugs talk in Camden schools &#124; Camden New Journal |access-date=3 May 2017 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20161114222533/http://www.camdennewjournal.com/camden-schools-drug-talks |archive-date=14 November 2016 |url-status=dead}}</ref>

===Cecchini/Lennox study===
In 2008, Narconon executive Marie Cecchini published, with Richard Lennox, a paper that claimed to show that the Narconon educational program reduced drug use among youths.<ref>{{cite journal |author1=Richard Lennox |author2=Marie Cecchini |year=2008 |title=The NARCONON™ drug education curriculum for high school students: A non-randomized, controlled prevention trial |journal=Substance Abuse Treatment, Prevention, and Policy |volume=3 |pages=8 |doi=10.1186/1747-597X-3-8 |pmc=2330037 |pmid=18348735 |doi-access=free }} The peer-reviewed paper, published in the journal ''Substance Abuse Treatment, Prevention, and Policy'', presented the findings of a research study conducted with approximately 1,000 Oklahoma and Hawaii high school students to test Narconon's high-school curriculum efficacy. They evaluated students using the Center for Substance Abuse Prevention (CSAP) Participant Outcome Measures for Discretionary Programs survey at three time periods: baseline, one month later, and six-month follow-up. Schools assigned to experimental conditions scheduled the Narconon curriculum between the baseline and one-month follow-up test; schools in control conditions received drug education after the six-month follow-up. The study concluded that at six-month follow-up, youths who received the Narconon drug education curriculum showed reduced drug use compared with controls across all drug categories tested; that the strongest effects were seen in all tobacco products and cigarette frequency followed by marijuana; that there were significant reductions measured for alcohol and amphetamines; that the program produced changes in knowledge, attitudes and perception of risk; and that the eight-module Narconon curriculum had thorough grounding in substance abuse aetiology and prevention theory, and reduced drug use among youths.</ref> However, the study was funded by Narconon's parent organisation, ABLE,<ref>{{cite web |url=http://www.guidestar.org/FinDocuments/2007/954/188/2007-954188814-04877c2f-9.pdf |title=Tax declaration ABLE 2007 |date=August 2008 |page=37 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20191230182246/https://pdf.guidestar.org/PDF_Images/2007/954/188/2007-954188814-04877c2f-9.pdf |archive-date=30 December 2019 |url-status=live |access-date=1 February 2012 |quote=ABLE funded a multi-year study of the delivery of the Narconon drug Education curriculum to high school students in Hawaii and Oklahoma, which was completed and written up in 2007. }} [http://thilo.tjps.eu/doc/2007-954188814-04877c2f-9.pdf Alt URL]{{Dead link|date=December 2024 |bot=InternetArchiveBot |fix-attempted=yes }}</ref><ref>{{cite journal|last=Beit-Hallahmi|first=Benjamin|title=Scientology: Religion or racket?|journal=Marburg Journal of Religion|date=1 September 2003|volume=8|issue=1|url=http://archiv.ub.uni-marburg.de/mjr/beit.html|access-date=5 September 2012|quote=For Scientology, using fronts is one way of obtaining funds from government and charity sources (Mallia, 1998c). ... The so-called drug rehabilitation program known as Narconon has been an incredibly profitable front through federal grants and corporate donations (Mallia, 1998c). Fronts may help one another look respectable and make more money. Thus, the Association for Better Living and Education (ABLE) may come out in support of Narconon}}</ref> and subsequent correspondence in the same journal asserted that the study's conclusions were contradicted by its own data: that the control group "were more likely to resist pressures to take drugs" than the Narconon group.<ref>{{cite journal |last=Catt |first=David |title=Further request for clarification |journal=Substance Abuse Treatment, Prevention, and Policy |date=11 June 2008 |volume=3 |issue=8 |pages=8 |doi=10.1186/1747-597X-3-8 |pmid=18348735 |pmc=2330037 |quote=In Table 9, item D22 shows that a greater percentage of the control group feel they can easily resist pressures to take drugs than the drug education group (78.8% compared with 74.5%). The text on page 11 of the report states that "students who received the curriculum were more likely to say they could resist pressures to use drugs than those who did not receive the program". Could I ask the authors to account for this seeming contradiction? |doi-access=free }}</ref>