By Lisa Provence

The good news is that they may be lying.

The bad news: 237 Albemarle County students reported carrying a weapon to school in 2000. That's a hundred more than in 1999.

For the past two years, Albemarle County sixth through 10th graders have been telling all in an anonymous Youth Risk Behavior Survey, and carrying a weapon to school is not the only category that showed a significant increase from 1999.

Albemarle students also confessed to smoking more-- at least in middle school, where 3.7 percent are frequent smokers, more than double the 1999 number. In high school, the number of regular smokers dropped slightly to 8.7 percent. Preferring to chew their tobacco are 5.8 percent of the middle schoolers and 9.8 percent of the high schoolers.

Albemarle County schools commissioned the first risk survey in 1999, and it was already in progress when 13 students were shot at Colorado's Columbine High School, according to Regina Kirk, health and physical education instructional coordinator for the County. The survey asks about all behaviors that affect youth, Kirk says. That includes intentional or unintentional injuries (fights in school, weapons use, suicide), tobacco use, alcohol and other drug use, diet, and physical inactivity. New in the 2001 survey are questions on sexual behavior.

Among the notable trends reported to the County School Board: fewer students in 2000 said they would report another student who carried a weapon to school than in 1999. And a much greater number reported carrying a weapon for "recreational" purposes. Some of their peers are nervous about this fact: around six percent say they've missed school because they felt unsafe.

So how safe are the County's schools when more than 200 kids claim to be packing weapons on school property?

"We take the survey with some reservations," says Kirk. "We can't factor out sensationalism." In fact, The Hook's middle school source says it's not uncommon for youths to lie on the survey.

The County also relies on the parents' survey, which shows that most parents perceive the schools to be safe ("I'm not saying that they're not," says Kirk). The central office communicates regularly with school resource officers and principals who keep discipline records.

"Most troubling-- both this year and last-- are the suicide numbers," says Kirk. In 2000, 307 middle school students and 198 high school students responded that they've attempted suicide, which prompts Kirk to wonder, "What do we need to change to get the message out there?

Although this, too, is another question administrators can't be sure was answered honestly, they're taking no chances. Kirk is working on a suicide prevention program. And the increases in tobacco use have the County considering whether tobacco prevention instruction needs to be beefed up.

Kirk says there are no national numbers to compare to determine whether the behavior of Albemarle students is riskier than the behavior of students in the rest of the nation. "The national numbers don't matter," she says. "We're looking at the trends in Albemarle County."

And those trends indicate that either the County is home to a bunch of armed and dangerous young people-- or there are a bunch of little fibbers out there.

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