Red Deer Catholic Regional Schools will host its second round of fentanyl information sessions for parents and students in March.
Dave Khatib, associate superintendent of inclusive learning, said a single session held in early January was an overwhelming success. Over 75 parents attended on short notice and others said that if they had known about it earlier they would have been there.
A Red Deer session will be held March 26, from 7 to 8 p.m. at École Seondaire Notre Dame High School. A Sylvan Lake session is scheduled for March 15, from 5:30 to 6:30 p.m. at École Mother Teresa School.
Red Deer Public Schools held a similar session at École Seondaire Lindsay Thurber Comprehensive High school in December.
Representatives from Turning Point, a community agency that has been responding to the opioid crisis, as well as RCMP will lead the March sessions.
Khatib said Turning Point was previously invited to speak with administration and counsellors and it was decided that what they learned had to be shared with parents.
“The information was kind of disturbing to us in it’s prevalence in society and how fentanyl is now making its way into all kinds of drugs we would not necessarily associate with an opioid,” Khatib said on Tuesday.
“Our hope is that we create a dialogue between students, parents, community and schools in regards to the opioid issue that’s really hitting our community very hard.”
He said fentanyl can be mixed into drugs like marijuana, and anyone experimenting with drugs for the very first time is at risk. Knowing that, hopefully parents will have more in-depth discussions about drugs with their sons and daughters.
“I think there’s a lot of mis-information out there.”
He said kits containing the medication naloxone to temporarily reverse opioid overdoses are available at the Catholic high schools and staff are being trained to use the injection kits.
Just like having AEDs (automated external defibrillators) in schools, naloxone allow staff to provide first aid, Khatib said.
“We are trying to make them available because we never know when we’ll run into an incident, not only with a student, but also possibly with anyone else in the community that might be close to the school.”
szielinski@reddeeradvocate.com
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