Alcohol: the right school of thought?

Alcohol exams for kids is one of the new initiatives designed to tackle concerns about underage drinking. Nigel Huddleston reports

Ninety-six pupils from the Phoenix School in London's Hammersmith will make history at a ceremony next month, when they'll become the first children to achieve a formal qualification in alcohol awareness.

They were among 150 participants in a pilot scheme for the BII's (British Institute of Innkeeping) Certificate in Alcohol Awareness (CAA), which is available to schools across the country for the new school year.

The Licensed Victuallers' School in Ascot, Berkshire, has already signed up to be the second school to try out the scheme.

The launch of the BII's CAA comes as the Government prepares to give new advice to teachers on how they should teach children about the effects of drinking on the body and how to treat alcohol responsibly.

Getting the message across

The National Curriculum stipulates when alcohol education should be given at different ages, both in science and personal, social & health education (PSHE) classes.

The science requirements are mandatory, but schools have the option to include the PSHE rules or not - a strategy which has led to patchwork delivery of alcohol education in schools.

The Drinkaware Trust campaigns and information director Kate Winstanley says: "It doesn't get the amount of attention it deserves. Because teaching it in PSHE isn't mandatory, it often falls off the curriculum and takes second place to issues such as smoking, drugs and sex."

Mike Eden, an Alcohol Concern policy officer on education, says the National Curriculum provisions within PSHE mean "it's left pretty much up to the schools whether they take it up," and adds that the teaching environment in which science is delivered may not be the best way to address the issue.

He says: "Alcohol features in science but that is very much a fact-based approach and has none of the feeling and discussion work that might go on in a subject such as PSHE.

"If it was done differently by people trained in the subject, that would be an improvement, but so often PSHE is taught in schools by anyone who happens to be available, or by the tutor in tutor groups, where they have to cover everything - death by 1,000 worksheets.

"In schools where it's taught well, there are teachers trained in those subjects who have enough time to teach."

The Drinkaware Trust's Winstanley says one solution would be to give PSHE statutory billing. "I certainly think it would help to give alcohol the place it deserves in schools," she says.

Existing teaching guidance on alcohol issues was published in 2004 by the old Department for Education & Skills (DfES). As part of broader guidelines on drug education as a whole, the guidance advised delivery of teaching by "people who know what they are talking about", and also recommended external contributors and use of interactive techniques.

"Kids need time to assimilate the information," says Eden at Alcohol Concern.

"They need to discuss it in a safe, open environment so that they can test the boundaries of their attitudes to alcohol and make an informed decision."

Projects such as the Just Say No campaign in Australia "just don't work", he says. "Kids will always experiment - and no other drug like alcohol becomes legal at a certain age. You have to give them the right information to make a choice."

Winstanley agrees: "Features of alcohol education have been shown to have a greater impact if they're participatory rather than passive in style, providing the opportunity for debate, role-playing and peer interaction. Rather than being lectured, they learn through involvement."

Industry response

The drinks industry has responded to this need for interaction in much of its own provision of teaching materials for schools.

The Drinkaware Trust, which took over the industry's combined educational efforts from the Portman Group when the trust was formed last year, aims to "present a balanced picture of how and why people drink alcohol" and has produced a series of worksheets and a CD-Rom called Streetwise.

The worksheets focus on a range of topics from what alcohol consists of, through the law on drinks sales, to the social and health effects of drinking.

The CD features an interactive town for pupils to explore, with different locations providing key information about why people drink and how it affects them.

Streetwise is in more than 50% of secondary schools and the Drinkaware Trust's long-term goal is to get it into every school. The trust also gives grants to ongoing local education projects.

"We are trying to offer a national resource, combined with the opportunity for local communities to develop their own solutions," says Winstanley.

The BII's CAA is part of the wider Schools Hospitality Project, backed by online quizzes for teachers to use in class and pupils to tackle themselves.

BII corporate communications manager Melanie Haynes says: "It's all about empowering children and giving them knowledge. The age group we're targeting - 13 to 16 years - experiences heavy peer pressure and there's a great deal of misinformation around. Many children only have access to knowledge passed on by older children."

If the drinks industry doesn't become involved in providing information for schools and youth groups to inform their education processes, it runs the risk that organisations with different agendas will do so instead.

Alcohol Concern, for example, has produced a "tool kit" for teachers and a guidance document advising that alcohol should be given equal status to illicit drugs in drugs education. The organisation is also running courses on how to address alcohol issues for youth workers and other interested practitioners.

But for the drinks industry, becoming too closely involved with schools could turn into a political hot potato. Several major drinks suppliers contacted for their views on alcohol education provision in schools declined to comment, while one high-profile member of the pub trade admitted he had "no idea" about the methods used to deliver alcohol education in schools or the effectiveness of such strategies.

Social responsibility

Generic projects such as those initiated by the BII and the Drinkaware Trust would seem the most likely future course of action. But one company that has a hand in alcohol education for young people is Diageo, which has circumnavigated thorny politics by funding projects run by third parties.

Among the activity the company has supported financially is a play on underage drinking themes staged by schools' theatre company CragRats.

Schools are made aware of Diageo's backing, but the content is devised by the theatre group, based on independent advice, and no mention of Diageo or its brands is made when the play is performed.

The CragRats play, Wasted, has been seen by almost 115,000 children in 690 schools, with 200 school visits planned for early 2008.

Diageo says qualitative feedback on the play shows that 96% of pupils who have seen it say it made them think about the effects of alcohol misuse, and 82% felt better equipped to deal with peer pressure to have a drink.

Diageo GB social responsibility manager Becki Rodi says: "We don't believe that people just wake up on their 18th birthday with all the facts and knowledge enabling them to have a glass of wine responsibly. While we don't want to educate people ourselves, we do want to support those who give young people the facts about alcohol."

But even a hands-off approach to alcohol education by suppliers may not suit everyone. One ex-teacher says: "I would never trust any company coming to me trying to sell education or offering it for free."

Others question whether schools are in the best position to deal with alcohol education.

A report by health academics from Liverpool John Moores University and the University of Keele concludes that "there is a lack of clear, long-ter