Students returning to Northfield High School will notice stepped-up drug prevention efforts on campus in the wake of this summer's allegations that dozens of students have been abusing heroin.

While many community members insist the problem has been overblown by Northfield's police chief, who announced the news to a gaggle of journalists in July, they acknowledge a problem does exist.

So this fall, the high school is going to try to do something about it.

Last week, high school Principal Joel Leer presented an update to the school board on the increased drug prevention efforts the school is going to undertake.

The school has doubled the amount of time a drug counselor will spend at Northfield High School and the Alternative Learning Center.

And the district is updating the drug education portion of the health curriculum and providing more opportunities for parents to learn about potential warning signs of drug use.

School officials and community members insist the heroin problem isn't a high school problem, but a community problem that has affected mostly graduates and drop-outs. They still insist, however, that increased efforts at the high school will help the issue.

"I don't think we're trying to address the drug problem by dealing with the people that are currently using the drug," said Northfield police officer Thad Monroe, the school district's resource officer. "The angle the school is taking is, 'Let's prevent more people from becoming involved in this.'"

School improvements

A school staff member followed a student into a bathroom and found the kid trying to get rid of an empty needle. A student happened upon another student waving a bag of marijuana in another student's face.

Both are incidents that happened in Northfield's schools last year, according to Monroe, who spends his entire workweek in district schools.

He plans to work on the parent and staff portion of the drug prevention push at the high school. The school previously held parent information meetings in conjunction with the local drug task force, but that was canceled last year for lack of interest.

He predicts this year's session will be packed.

"I think it was a wake-up call to just about everyone in town," Monroe said. "To me, it's not important whether the statistics were all correct. There is definitely an upswing in the use of [heroin], and that's a huge problem."

Last week, the school board approved a $30,000 contract with Sarah Shippy, a behavioral-health specialist starting her fifth year working with the district.

The contract doubles the amount of time she'll spend with students. She'll be at the high school all day every Thursday and will spend Monday and Tuesday mornings at the Alternative Learning Center. She also wants to start a school support group for students recovering from addiction.

Expanded curriculum

Northfield Superintendent Chris Richardson and Monroe admit the high school health curriculum may be out of date, or focused more on methamphetamine than heroin, because experts thought meth was the bigger threat. Students at the high school take health for a semester of their sophomore year.