VERO BEACH, Fla. (CBS12) — School starts in our area next month.
Student vaping is one of the concerns schools now face and one school district in our area has taken a big step to deal with it. So, for school administrators, one goal this year is cracking down on vaping on campus.
The Vero Beach High School Freshman Learning Center is one of the schools where vape monitors were installed last school year and that has resulted in fewer students vaping at school.
“It’s a relatively new phenomenon and definitely an epidemic amongst our young people and a real concern for us,” said Shawn O’Keefe, Vero Beach High School Principal.
Vaping at school is not allowed and the Indian River County School District has installed vape monitors in some of the boys and girls’ restrooms and locker rooms.
“Since the vape sensors have been in there and they realize they’re in there, they’re less likely to be in there vaping,” said Juliette Carroll, Vero Beach High School Freshman Learning Center Asst. Principal.
The vape monitors are mounted on the ceiling and protected by a cage so they can’t be pulled down and destroyed.
“Sometimes they’re in groups in the bathrooms. We’ve found them (students) in groups. They’ll go into a stall, and you’ll find five or ten students in one stall, sharing a vape and passing it around,” O’Keefe said.
When the vape monitor detects a vape being used, it sends an alert to computers in the offices of the principal and assistant principals.
“Our computers will alert. There will be an alarm that will go off and then it actually brings up our cameras instantaneously to that location,” O’Keefe explained.
There are no cameras in restrooms. But, by looking at a hallway camera near the restroom, school officials will immediately be able to tell which student or students were in the bathroom.
“I know that it’s very addictive and so the students that are already addicted to it are going to have a hard time stopping. The kids that are just trying it for the first time, we’re hoping this deters them,” said Teri Barenborg, Indian River County School Board Chair.
Barenborg says they’ve spent about $75,000 to get the vape monitors and she feels it was money well spent. In the 2023-2024 school year, the first year the Indian River County School District had the vape monitors in some of the schools, 55 students were caught vaping.
“I know that the principals have reported the amount of vaping that we have on our campuses has decreased tremendously since we’ve put these in and they’re able to spot it really quickly,” Barenborg said.
The vape monitors have proven their worth and school officials say they’re now in the process of ordering them for all the middle and high schools in the district.
If a student is caught vaping in a school restroom or locker room in Indian River County, if it’s a first offense they get a tobacco citation with a $25 or $30 fine from a deputy and they are placed in an in-school suspension timeout for three days.
Second offense, they go to a school district alternative education center for three days.
Third offense, they get two days out-of-school suspension.
Last year the vape monitors were installed in several schools in Indian River County as a pilot project.
The school district says no parents have complained about the vape monitors, which can detect nicotine vapes and also THC vapes.
0 Comments