admin posted on January 26, 2011 04:11
Fifth graders Eli Squier and Matthew Jordan recently listened to Matthews Police Officer Karen Greene discuss the harm of tobacco use. Officer Greene was at their school, Elizabeth Lane Elementary, teaching the class as part of the DARE curriculum.
Students learn that tobacco use harms a person’s body as well as the environment. Using a mason jar full of cigarette butts she talked to them about how many years it takes for the tobacco items to decompose. “I talked to them about taking pride in their bodies and their community by not abusing tobacco products,” said Officer Greene. Several weeks later one of the parents showed Greene a photo of the boys picking up cigarette butts. On their own the boys had asked their parents to drive them to a shopping center and a park where they picked up cigarette butts.
“It was cold and started to sleet that day but this was what they wanted to do and they had fun doing it. They picked up two gallon bags of cigarette butts that day,” Phillip Jordan, Matthew’s dad, commented.
“I was amazed that the lesson on looking after their community ‘stuck’ with them. Eli and Matthew took it upon themselves to ask their parents to take them to do this. I did not ask them to do it and this was not for community service. They just wanted to do something to make a difference and to have a clean community,” Greene also said.