Facebook Twitter K1-TEXT Email Print

News

Bartlesville Public Schools

Posted: May 06, 2019 7:00 AMUpdated: May 06, 2019 10:30 AM

BPS to Give Presentation on Vaping in Schools

Share on RSS

 

Garrett Giles

Parents, district staff, and community members are invited to attend public presentations on students and vaping on Monday, May 13th. The presentation will take place at noon and again at 6:00 p.m. in the Hospitality Room of the Bruin Field House.

District staff from Bartlesville High School, Central Middle School, and Madison Middle School will share what parents need to know about e-cigarettes, JUULs, and vaping in light of district policy and procedures for tobacco/nicotine and the legal implications for minors with tobacco/nicotine.

Planning for additional presentation dates is underway. For more information, contact Kerry Ickleberry, the district's Safe & Healthy Schools Coordinator.

Visitors can park in the lot south of 18th street and use the Fine Arts Center and Field House entrance off 18th Street. The Hospitality Room is down short hallways to your right as you enter the lobby with the Bruin bear statue.

Senate Bill 33 was signed into law by Oklahoma Governor Kevin Stitt on Monday. After conducting an interim study last fall, Owasso’s Senator J.J. Dossett filed legislation for the 2019 session that would extend tobacco product bans through the Tobacco-Free Schools Act to vaping.

Dossett says under Senate Bill 33, the Tobacco-Free Schools Act, which bans tobacco products in all forms, would extended the ban to vapor products, including the noncombustible devices as well as the cartridges whether or not they contain nicotine.

In addition to the harm nicotine can cause to children and teens, Dossett says there are other chemicals in the aerosol from e-cigarettes that are also alarming.  Diacetyl, which is used in flavoring vaping products, has been linked to an irreversible and serious lung condition called obliterative bronchiolitis. The aerosol also contains other chemicals and heavy metals.  Further studies are being conducted to determine the impact of these materials on the user and for those exposed to secondhand vapors.

He says when they had their interim study on vaping, he heard from educators, administrators and parents who were very concerned about how pervasive it’s become on school property. Kids, Dossett says, think it’s safe for them to use, when the study they performed says otherwise. With all these serious health concerns, Dossett says it just makes sense to extend the school tobacco ban to vaping.

Sen. Dossett says if you look at the studies coming out from the Federal Drug Administration and the U.S. Surgeon General’s office, there is clear evidence that vaping is harmful to adolescents. The studies show that it gets kids addicted to nicotine which can harm their still-developing brains.  That, Dossett says, is a fact that nicotine can affect decision making and impulse control.

Dossett believes his bill will close the vaping loophole so these products cannot be used in schools.


« Back to News