Drugs at Private Schools

[abignael]

I have a DD in Sixth Form at a Surrey private school (day school) and I was recently looking at schools for my DS for the 11+ next year. I asked for her opinion on schools in the local area and was shocked that most her responses included references to the pupils there being “druggies.” I was particularly appalled when she told me that pupils at a school where I know a housemistress frequently smuggle in Ketamine and take it in their dorms. Apparently this is not uncommon at private schools - particularly boarding ones according to her. I won’t name the schools as I feel dragging their names through the mud at the behest of a teenage girl is inappropriate but could anyone enlighten me on this?

Oh, and my DC is at a private (day) school.

@Changeau you may never know where a dealer is. Plenty of rich kids are also the school small time dealer.

Unless you are considering stare options for your DS, then this isn't really the question to be asking yourself. Probably better to research the history of drugs issues at the schools you're looking at, and asking how they were handled.

I went to a rough state secondary. I hadn't even come across drugs until I met a friend who went to private school. They had the money to afford them, and the confidence that if they got caught then they wouldn't have to face consequences

I went to a Surrey private school and I bet I can guess the school you and your daughter are talking about 😂

My DD’s friend went to v posh boarding school- he was an A* student, head of hockey team, and a dealer. Sold loads to fellow pupils.

I have a feeling (having read this thread) this could be easily applied to most boarding schools / private schools. Although I would not be surprised based on what my daughter said if this particular school had a wider reputation.

No drugs on the premises? I can almost guarantee you that this isn’t true…

Well, you can't actually.

lol. academically high achieving private school kids is the number one profile of drug users I have come across.

Posher the school, harder the drugs. I thought everyone knew that.

Of course state school pupils only drink fruit cider and maybe have a puff of weed

All schools have drugs. Very interesting about the housemistress smuggling in drugs.

@Changeau

You sound naive. Years ago cocaine was the drug of choice for those in private and boarding schools. It was elusive and expensive, and it helped you with your studies and didn’t really hinder you like the prolific cannabis smoking at nearby states. The latter dulling motivation. Also, drug dealers don’t “hang out” in affluent areas. That would be ridiculously stupid and they would be attracting unwanted attention to themselves. It’s all done with car journeys and WhatsApp messages. Getting drugs into the more affluent areas is seen as a very aspiring thing to do as an up and coming dealer.

Tbf there were a lot of drugs in my state school because half the catchment area drew on a liberal parent/affluent area that wasn’t dissimilar to the intake of the local private schools. I think at university I noticed a difference in that amongst the really wealthy privately educated students there we’re definitely some who literally did not have any concerns about the impact heavy drug use would have on their future prospects - as in they knew there was a job available at x firm and they’d all be smashing coke every weekend with their colleagues anyway.

obv not everyone who’d been to a private school was like that but there was a really gross contingent of them. They were the really rich end of the spectrum though. Eg. I know a boy who’d been to a very well known public school for boys, took loads of coke, crashed a borrowed car with a passenger in it into someone’s cottage and ran away leaving her behind. He was an absolute bellend.

@Changeau

Certainly was the case when I was at school and I’m 34. The drug of choice at our state was cannabis. I was unusual in that I had two sets of friends. One at my school and another set that I had been introduced too by new step father at the time. Yes they did have harder drugs, mostly class A. They just seemed more dumb in comparison to my state school friends. A bit like, nothing bad could ever happen to them which I think in a way did stem from a sense of entitlement and othering. Oh no, only bad things happen to other people. Me and my friends were much more wary over drugs but then we did have more education within school at the time. I was the Leah Betts era and pretty terrified of even taking one pill. I remember my friends in the private school next to us didn’t even watch those videos at school.

I think it really depends on your "crowd" - I was never even offered any drugs or saw any being taken at parties, but there was a huge fear of putting a foot out of line and perfectionism and there was a lot of anorexia around (I bet they are the same kind of girls that are trans boys now). Plenty of drinking though. DBro 2 years below I suspect had a v different experience but he was far more popular and sporty than I ever was.

My DC were in a state school, working class area and the police were called about 4 days each week due to pupils dealing drugs in the school. A few overdoses too. It’s not only private schools.

Also, back in the 90’s I was out with my sister and her friends, teachers. She went to the loo and a friend asked if she wanted some cocaine. This was a primary school teacher.

@AdoraBell

Yes Coke was the drug of choice for educated professionals. Not so much anymore the street value has decreased. I think now in 2023 drugs are widespread in states and privates, but there are definitely a section of society who thinks that that carry on doesn’t happen in private schools.

I went to a few private schools - day and boarding - and there were some kids taking drugs, but very much in the minority and most people thought them complete idiots.
Same for my sibling and cousins who were at various other private / public boarding schools.
On the other hand, my niece and godchildren's state schools are absolutely terrible for drugs and unlike in my experience, kids taking them seem to seen as cool. Sad.

@Easterfunbun I remember Leah Betts and also everyone had a story of a friend of a friend who was at a party and took some drug laced with who knows what, thought they could fly and jumped out a top floor window and got impaled on the railings below, or thought they had bugs under their skin and scratched their face down to the bone etc. I think alcohol was thought to be much safer, I certainly thought it was at the time (like the idiot teenager I was).

@Xiaoxiong

Whilst I don’t think alcohol is safe I’m still glad as a teen I chose a small bottle of lambrini to drink in the park on a Friday night other than a pill. Although having said that, the dosage of E was far safer back in the 90s and not this synthetic MDMA crap that I now worry about my kids potentially taking.

Ask yourself why such schools do not have drug testing if it is a real concern.

The answer is that they would lose a lot of their pupils. Schools are the same everywhere - private schools may have more expensive drugs but they have them and they are used.

These kids have access to money and therefor access to drugs. It’s the same in the schools in the more affluent parts of my borough.

It was an extremely common problem in the private schools in my hometown in the late 90s. The kids had access to more money, so bought drugs with it. I went to a state school but had a lot of friends at private schools. They were the bad influence!

There were drugs at the state school too but really just weed and speed, nothing much else.