By Greta Nerad
Executive News Editor
Mira Costa High School’s administration is in the process of looking for a product to be installed in school restrooms to detect nicotine from vaping device usage.
After Principal Dr. Ben Dale heard from Palos Verdes High School that these products existed during the 2017- 2018 school year, he considered installing them. According to Dale, he decided to contact schools that had them to see how they were working.
“There was a product that came out, and schools jumped all over it, and the feedback we got was that it was unreliable,” Dale said. “They said it’s been nothing but a problem.”
According to Dale, the main issue with the device is its sensitivity to other fumes such as those from cologne, perfume and hand lotion. Additionally, the sensors cause disturbances due to their loud siren alert system.
“They make a loud siren screaming noise, and that’s not something you want going off at random times,” Dale said. “We hope that the siren would be a deterrent, but you also have to take into account that kids would just set it off just to set it off.”
These sensors would mainly serve as a deterrent from vaping in the restrooms, rather than a means of catching those who do, Dale said. However, if school security guards notice students rushing from the bathrooms when the alarm goes off, they will stop the students, Dale said.
“You’re less inclined to go into the bathroom and vape with the idea that there’s a sensor there that may or may not go School Resource Officer Shawn Thompson said. “They’d rather risk it, so it’s just going to deter the kids from going in the bathroom.”
According to School Resource Officer Mike Sistoni, the sensors will only address vaping in the restrooms. Students can still find other places to vape on campus, School Resource Officer Terry Yrigoyen said.
“It will deter them from vaping in the bathroom, but it won’t deter them from doing it somewhere else,” Sistoni said.
If the administration were to install the sensors, Dale would not inform the students unless someone at the district level told him he had to, he said. However, Dale recognizes that students would find out soon after the installation due to the siren sounding, he said.
“The administration should inform the students about all the new additions to the school’s campus,” senior Saul Droutman said. “If they don’t, it doesn’t seem like they are trying to stop a problem, but rather get more kids in trouble.”
According to Dale, the sensors would not replace the drug dogs that regularly patrol the campus for drugs. While the drug dogs are trained to identify the scent of drugs, such as cocaine, heroin and methamphetemine, as well as marijuana and other THC products, they do not detect nicotine, Yrigoyen said.
“They’re just trained with marijuana [vapes]; I don’t believe they can detect nicotine,” Yrigoyen said. “Other drugs yes, but with nicotine no.”
According to Dale, fall of 2017 is when vaping became popular. While the num- ber of discipline infractions that the ad- ministration faces has decreased recently, on-campus vaping still persists, Dale said. The SROs cite Costa students for vape-related offenses about once or twice a week, Yrigoyen said.
“I’m not ready to say we’ve cured vap- ing,” Dale said. “If we had a machine that could make vaping stop on campus, I would’ve already bought it.”
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