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• New alcohol, drug, tobacco rules oversee student activities 

JUNEAU — Students will have to abide by new rules regarding drug, alcohol and tobacco use if they want to participate in sports and other extracurricular activities next fall.

Schools had been developing their own guidelines until now, but the Alaska School Activities Association board of directors this week adopted a statewide policy that includes penalties that are cumulative and grow progressively harsher with each violation.

More than 70 percent of the 40,000 students in Alaska participate in some kind of extracurricular activity, said Gary Matthews, ASAA executive director.

“We have something that kids want to do and that’s to be able to play. In order to be able to play we hold them to higher standards now,” . . .

The penalties range from a 10-day suspension from activities for a first offense . . . If a student is caught using tobacco during the suspension, the clock starts over. The student must complete the 10 days no matter how many times the suspension is restarted.

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Fury as teacher lights up in classroom 

A teacher has provoked fury after lighting a cigarette in the classroom and offering pupils a puff.

At least two pupils smoked the cigarette given to them by Jim McIntee during a lesson aimed at deterring them from smoking at the Canterbury Rudolf Steiner School.

The incident has prompted families to remove their children from the fee-paying independent school at Perry Court, Chartham.

Among them is Tracy Carver, whose 12-year-old son was offered the cigarette.

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Parents pull children out of school after teacher passes round cigarette to class 

Parents who enrolled their children at a Rudolf Steiner school knew it would provide an alternative to traditional education.

But when a teacher lit a cigarette in a classroom and allowed some of the children to take a puff, it was a little too alternative for some. . . .

The incident unfolded at the 200-pupil Canterbury Steiner School in Kent as teacher Jim McIntee was attempting to illustrate the effects of smoking of smoking on the lungs during a physiology lesson.

To the astonishment of his 12-year-old pupils, he not only lit up, but then passed the cigarette around.

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Kent | Teacher lit cigarette in lesson 

A teacher at a private school has been reprimanded after he lit a cigarette and offered it to pupils during a lesson.

In a statement the Canterbury Steiner School, in Chartham, Kent, said Jim McIntee, carried out the act to "positively discourage smoking".

It said he received disciplinary action but was a valued member of staff.

Parent Martin Roche said two or three people had removed their children but most parents trusted the school.

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Parents pull children out of Steiner school after teacher passes round cigarette to class 

Parents who enrolled their children at a Rudolf Steiner school knew it would provide an alternative to traditional education.

But when a teacher lit a cigarette in a classroom and allowed some of the children to take a puff, it was a little too alternative for some.

Now three families have withdrawn their children from the £7,000-a-year school in protest after the science teacher was allowed to keep his job.

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Anger After Students Allowed To Smoke On School Trip 

A COLLEGE has come under fire from parents and anti-smoking campaigners after a group of young students were allowed to smoke with staff supervision during a trip abroad.

More than 200 youngsters from Northallerton College, in Northallerton, North Yorkshire, went on a skiing trip to Austria during the Easter holidays.

A group of 16 students, who are aged 15 and 16 and are not legally allowed to buy tobacco, were allowed to smoke cigarettes under the supervision of staff.

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Smoking ban may get revision 

Changes could be coming to Lexington's 4-year-old law that prohibits smoking in almost all enclosed public places.

Urban County Councilman David Stevens is spearheading an effort to review the "persistent problems" with the current law and to recommend the first revisions to the public indoor smoking ban since it was implemented in April 2004.

Problems with the law include enforcement issues such as gathering the proper documentation to prosecute a smoking ban citation in the courts and whether the patron doing the smoking or the business where the patron is smoking should be cited for violating the ban.

The largest problem is the bingo halls and whether high school booster clubs that run bingo should be considered private organizations, which are exempt from the smoking ban

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Japan may get regional smoking ban: official 

Japan, long seen as a smokers' haven, could soon have a ban on lighting up in bars, restaurants and other public places in the country's second largest prefecture, an official said Wednesday.

The proposed ban in Kanagawa Prefecture southwest of Tokyo would also apply to amusement venues, schools, hospitals and department stores in the region, home to Japan's second-largest city, Yokohama.

The prohibition would be the first of its kind in Japan, which is slowly becoming less tolerant of smoking in public. Offenders may be fined.

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China toughens smoking ban in schools before Games  

China has further tightened smoking restrictions -- targeting schools and day care centers -- as it extends a crackdown linked to its pledge to hold a smoke-free Olympics.

Last month, Beijing formally pledged to restrict smoking in most public venues in the city, including government offices and public transport, beginning on May 1.

In a separate move reported on Wednesday, China ordered primary schools, secondary schools and day care centers across the country to prohibit even designated smoking zones, an effort to promote 'non-smoking campuses' ahead of the Games. . . .

The newspaper added that a poll of student smokers under the age of 15 showed that 22.4 percent of young smokers were male and 3.9 percent female.

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China to implement complete smoking ban in schools 

China's health departments are planning a complete smoking ban in nurseries and schools next month.

Wednesday's Beijing News quoted the Ministry of Health as saying nurseries, as well as primary and middle schools would be banned from having smoking rooms.

The ministry said the premise of a "no smoking campus" would soon kick off as part of the activities for the 21st World No Tobacco Day on May 31.

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China toughens smoking ban in schools before Games  

China has further tightened smoking restrictions -- targeting schools and day care centres -- as it extends a crackdown linked to its pledge to hold a smoke-free Olympics.

Last month, Beijing formally pledged to restrict smoking in most public venues in the city, including government offices and public transport, beginning on May 1.

In a separate move reported on Wednesday, China ordered primary schools, secondary schools and day care centres across the country to prohibit even designated smoking zones, an effort to promote 'non-smoking campuses' ahead of the Games.

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• China Extends Smoking Ban to Campuses 

China will ban smoking on school campuses as part of an effort to cut down on tobacco use before the Olympics, state media said Wednesday.

The Health Ministry will ban smoking on all school premises - kindergartens through high school - beginning on World No Tobacco Day on May 31, the Beijing Evening News said. . . .

The Health Department will also work with other departments to crack down on illegal tobacco advertising, especially ads that target young smokers.

In China almost 2 trillion cigarettes are sold every year.

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New smoking restrictions start today 

Another round of restrictions on where you can smoke in BC kicks in today. There will be no more smoking chambers in BC pubs or casinos, and most public doorways now come with a three metre smoke-free buffer zone.

One smoker this morning says he understands it's all for the good of the whole but he says new rules won't do much to help him kick the habit.

New rules also affect those who sell smokes.

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Schools to have tobacco monitors 

ill now, schools had class monitors -- students chosen to maintain classroom decorum. But with nearly 1 in 10 school children aged 13-15 years consuming some form of tobacco, a concerned health ministry is now planning to introduce a new concept -- tobacco monitors. A strategy to involve the youth in India's fight against tobacco, these tobacco monitors will not only act as peer educators to deter their classmates from smoking but will also have the power to check bags for tobacco products. Tobacco education is also being made part of the school curriculum to make students aware on the ill-effects of smoking. According to health ministry officials, the idea's feasibility is being studied in a pilot anti-tobacco school programme, which was recently initiated in 18 districts of nine states.

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• 30% teachers chew gutkha, smoke 

The Union health ministry’s Global School Personnel Survey 2006 has found that teachers, who are actually expected to deter students from taking up smoking, are themselves tobacco addicts.

The survey conducted with technical assistance from Centre for Disease Control, Atlanta, and World Health Organisation among 3,629 teachers from 180 schools says 3 out of 10 school personnel (29.2%) use tobacco products — cigarettes, beedis and gutka. While over 50% of the teachers and clerks from schools in Arunachal Pradesh, Assam, Manipur, Meghalaya, Mizoram, Nagaland, Sikkim and Tripura were found to use tobacco products, the number stood at almost 40% of teachers from Bihar, Jharkhand, Orissa and West Bengal.

What’s worse, one-fourth (25.1%) of the school personnel reported smoking or chewing tobacco on the school premises.

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