The other concerns the safety of adolescent and young adult college students who might be enticed to use drugs as an escape from teen problems.
This program calls for random drug tests on college students.
The Commission on Higher Education (Ched) said it is going to “create a program for college students who will be found positive in the drug testing in randomly selected schools.
The two programs, when implemented, would have provided the long-needed assistance to the young in school.
Nutrition needs
It is undeniable that children from the countryside, who come from the low-income families, are in need of nutritional supplements more than do children in urban centers, most of them being from middle and upper-middle income families.
Children of low income and poor families need such intervention from the government.
Nutritional deficiencies among the young who are in schools and who live in the towns are most prevalent in developing nations like ours.
And yet “government intervention to improve the nutrition of school children have not been enough, based on comparative data” on weights of the children.
It has long been pointed out that the government needs to sustain its assistance program in order to effectively fight malnutrition.
“During the start of school year 2004-2005, some 23.5 percent of grade school pupils in the region weighed below normal…The figure slightly increased to 23.74 the following school year, although it reduced by 5.03 percent when the school year ended.”
But last school year, “underweight pupils decreased to 16.51 percent.”
Drug test
On the other hand, Ched has reported creating “a special program for college students who will be found positive in the drug testing.”
Done in coordination with schools and parents, the program does not intend to punish the youth but is designed to “address the needs of the students so they will no longer resort to using dangerous drugs.”
If our national leaders accept the notion that education is the foundation of a strong democracy, then the twin programs the government is set to pursue are moves well-taken.
We hope the government would be able to sustain them.
