Press Release: For Immediate Release

Patricia Weathers, President 845-677-8115

Sheila Matthews, National Vice President 203-966-8419

May 14, 2004

 

PBS FRONTLINE Markets Misleading Information to Public Schools on Columbine School Shootings

In a Frontline PBS documentary style marketing pitch that aired on May 13, PBS simply misleads viewers by attempting to justify the profiling of boys through checklists to predict violent behavior.  PBS has failed to mention the fact that Littleton, Colorado had in place a psychological education program, which first came to Littleton in 1991 under the name “outcome-based education”.  This million dollar psychological based program was in place prior to the school shootings and failed to prevent the very violence that occurred.  PBS is marketing this misleading information for a fee to school officials.

Let us not forgot that Eric Harris enrolled in a psychological school based program called, “Conflict Resolutions” and was on a drug called Luvox.  In a Special Report, Perscription Drugs May Trigger Killings, human rights award-winning reporter, Kelly Patricia O’Meara wrote, “The physician’s desk reference (PDR) records that, during controlled clinical trials of Luvox, manic reactions developed in 4 percent of children. Mania is defined as “a form of psychosis characterized by exalted feelings, delusions of grandeur…and overproduction of ideas”. Court records show that the prescription for Harris had been filled 10 times between April 1998 and March 1999, and that three-and-a-half months before the shooting the dose had been increased- a common thread many experts say they are finding prior to adverse reactions to psychotropic drugs.  The autopsy on Harris revealed a “therapeutic level” of Luvox in his system.”

O’Meara’s Special Report stated, “Other school shooters on antidepressants at the time of their attacks include 15 year old Kip Kinkel who, while on Prozac, killed his parents and then proceeded to school where he opened fire on classmates, killing two and wounding 22 others; 14-year old Elizabeth Bush, on “antidepressants” when she wounded one student at Bishop Neumann High School in Williamsport, PA; and 18 year-old Jason Hoffman, on Effexor and Celexa when he wounded one teacher and three students at Granite Hills High School in El Cajon, CA.”

B.K. Eakman, Executive director of the National Education Consortium and author of “Cloning of the American Mind: Eradicating Morality Through Education”, writes in an Washington Times Op-Ed piece on Monday, April 26, 1999 following the Columbine shootings. “Last week the cumulative effect of therapeutic/socialization-style education hit critical mass.  Parents in Littleton, Colo., got a good jolt of the “mental hygiene” approach to schooling, up close and personal.  Drug education, refusal skills, self-esteem, and relationships became the centerpieces of the curriculum, pushing academics to the back burner.”

Rewriting history and leaving critical information out so that the public cannot make informed decisions regarding the funding and potential classification and profiling of children within the public education system, is criminal.  For Frontline to market this junk science to public schools is an outrage.

While we applaud Kevin Dwyer, the President of the National Association of School Psychologists for criticizing the number of checklists and expressing concerns regarding profiling, labeling, and stigmatization of children, we would like to point out that he failed to address the involvement the National Association of School Psychologists had in the role at Columbine.  His association, The National Association of School Psychologists, also opposes, “The Child Medication Safety Act”, an anti-coercion bill to protect against forced drugging of children.

Our organization calls on the United States Government to prevent misleading and dangerous information from entering our public schools.  This is a public health issue on the National level.  For more information on the crisis regarding behavioral modification drugs visit www.ablechild.org.