MARYSVILLE Each spring teachers try to scare their students away from drugs, particularly alcohol, as seniors get ready to party during prom and graduation seasons.
They haul the hulks of cars wrecked under the influence by drivers under the age of consumption, they preach and they teach. This year they used a ghost of years past.
School leaders brought one of
M-Ps own home to show that the choice to use drugs or to even be around those that do can be deadly. In 2002, a former Tommie was murdered by her estranged boyfriend and his gang. Rachel Burkheimer was a bright and vivacious 18-year-old whose life turned south and met a tragic end due to the influence of drugs on her and her friends.
Ali Taylor graduated that year and spoke to the current crop of M-P grads about how her best friends life was cut short. Students watched a documentary produced by a local television station in which family members described Burkheimers tragic end. Taylor explained how five years ago she and her peers sat in the very same bleachers and heard the same old message about drinking and driving.
Rachel made these choices and now shes not with us, Taylor said, adding that Burkheimer and two other friends all died within 18 months of each other due to drugs. They are all buried in the Marysville cemetery. Go see for yourself, Taylor challenged the teens.
They form a triangle: if you kids use drugs a friend could be up here someday speaking about you, Taylor said.
The assembly started with several students talking of their experiences disasters, actually with drugs and alcohol. Some described watching loved ones disintegrate through addiction and listed the effects on their siblings and themselves.
Alexis Searles is an 18-year-old senior who climbed back on top from the bottom of a well. She said she started smoking marijuana at age 10 and soon progressed to using cocaine, ecstasy and OxyContin daily.
I was willing to try whatever you put in front of me, Searles said. The torture drugs caused me was not worth it in the end.
Today she carries a 3.8 grade point average and is headed to Everett Community College where she will start work on a bachelors degree in sociology.
I want to work with people like myself, to help save the kids, Searles said.
After the speeches were over she and several of her peers took a pledge to stay away from drugs by plopping their hands into puddles of colorful paint to signify their choice. They made an imprint on pieces of paper which will be posted on the school walls. The rest of the student body is encouraged to do the same, with the print serving as their signature on their pledge to avoid the edge.
Were trying to get kids to pledge that theyll be safe, explained teacher Jim Pankiewicz, lead organizer for the event.
He said six students agreed to share their stories but two backed out at the last minute, but regretted not telling their tales after the assembly. The schools security director told him that she had been working for some time on a student heading down the wrong path, and that Taylors message about Burkheimer made a difference. According to Pankiewicz, security director Anne Carlson said that troubled girl approached her after the assembly, asking if Burkheimer was the former M-P student Carlson had told her about. They quickly put two-and-two together, according to Mr. P.
She said, Thats it, Im done with it now, Pankiewicz recalled, adding that Carlson told him I believe Rachel saved a life today.
In the coming weeks more students are expected to make the same decision, and administrators hope the wall of prints will grow.