To: School Committee, Superintendent
Cc: Lisa Mazzola
From: Margaret Albright, Margie Ross Decter
Date: July 6, 2016
Re: Opioid use prevention and policy – compliance with state law
Colleagues,
Attached are three policies we are required to have in order to comply with M.G.L. 71:96 passed in the spring as part of opioid addiction prevention legislation. A group comprised of Jill Murray, Heather Richards, Margie, Margaret and Attorney Mike Gilbert from MASC, have reviewed the policies to remove redundancies and ensure these comply with all state laws and DESE directives. We have also checked to ensure that the policies are in line with our student rights and responsibilities and our employee expectations. These follow the recommended format and content from MASC.
Once these are voted on we need to:
1) Post these on our website as required by the law
2) Submit these policies to DESE as required by the law
In addition, we note that the administration should also:
1) Review the substance abuse curriculum/teaching we are doing in elementary grades as the law stipulates the use of an evidence-based curriculum.
2) Send written comments to Commissioner Chester about the final phase of the law – Screening, Brief Intervention and Referral to Treatment (SBIRT) which has yet to be implemented and for which DESE is creating a CMR. DESE is seeking comment on this requirement – specifically at what grade levels should we be required to offer SBIRT. As we are one of a very few districts with experience screening students for depression MASC recommends we share our experience and any suggestions with the Commissioner.
We will have a smattering of these policies during our review process which require more immediate action for pressing legal/regulatory reasons or in order to update our student and employee handbooks for the coming school year. The majority of our policy updates will come to you as one large change/update later this year. So if you have a burning issue, have patience. We’ll get to it.