‘Nobody was looking to understand’: High schoolers discuss substance use at Oregon Recovery Community Summit

At the DoubleTree Hotel near Lloyd Center, in the heart of Northeast Portland, the Oregon Recovery Community Summit filled the hotel conference center’s hallways with chatter and laughter.

At the last session before dinner on Friday, March 15, a small crowd gathered outside the Ross Island room, drawn to the voices of the teenage panelists.

The seven students on the “Youth Speak: Sobriety and Stigma for the Current Generation” panel answered questions from the audience and discussed the ongoing substance use crisis in Oregon affecting their generation, peers and themselves.

The panel was composed of four students from West Linn High School’s Teen Advisory Board, the student club focused on drug and alcohol prevention and awareness, and three students from Harmony Academy in Lake Oswego, Oregon’s first recovery high school.

“I just want to applaud everybody on this panel for having the courage to show up and have these kinds of discussions,” said Sharon Dursi Martin, Harmony’s founding principal and moderator of the panel. “I just want everybody in this room to remember as we navigate the discussions that everybody’s coming here with their own ideas, and like we all know, there’s no one path to recovery.”

According to the most recent National Survey on Drug Use and Health, Oregon ranks first for the prevalence of illicit drug use and last for access to mental health resources. As use among Oregonians rises, dangerous and illicit substances can make their way into the hands of kids and teens. During the panel, many of the students expressed how challenges with drug and alcohol use began at home — for some as young as 12 or 13 years old.

“I think at school a lot of kids think, ‘It could never be me,’ or, ‘All my friends are doing it and it’s fine,’” said Natalie Swartley, a West Linn student, during the panel. “I think it’s important that we don’t let addiction be minimized just because it doesn’t look the way people assume it should.”

The West Linn students said many of their peers use drugs and alcohol socially, something that concerns students with a history of addiction or recovery in their families. An important part of the Teen Advisory Board is National Alcohol and Drug Fact Week, when the students answer questions about substances for their peers.

Another common theme was the easy access to drugs on social media platforms like Snapchat.

“There’s a lot of really harmful Twitter communities out there,” said Bea Curran, a Harmony Academy student after the panel concluded. “It’s just crazy that we have access to that as young people.”

Landon Lea, another Harmony student, said he thought that the access to dealers on social media had certainly led to an increase in the number of young people using drugs.

However, that didn’t mean that the group had lost hope.

Part of what excited the students about joining the panel was the first conversation the group had at Harmony Academy with Pam Pearce, the director of Community Living Above.

“I just really appreciate that there are people who are not actively dealing with this themselves or have gotten past it, who are looking to understand and support. The majority of the people in my school, I was heavily looked down upon as a ‘junkie tweaker whatever addict.’ I would get made fun of for nodding off in class or whatever was going on,” said Carter Bravery, a Harmony Academy student. “Nobody was looking to understand. I think a lot of people want to grab on to a group or someone that they can blame and hold the anger and not look to understand what it would be like, so I just really appreciate that you guys do that.”

For the West Linn students, who’ve seen peers struggle with addiction, Harmony represents a recovery pathway for young people.

“It’s great to see that you guys want it for yourselves,” said Jonathan Garcia. “I hope you guys know how incredibly impactful meeting you was — we were just so grateful that we met the three of you. The conversations we had were just so real. There was no faking.”

The students exchanged social media accounts and dinner vouchers before venturing back into the conference.

“I think there’s just such a gap between people that are like us and then people who’ve never done anything before, but you guys really seem to have more of a deep understanding and that’s really cool,” said Landon Lae, a Harmony Academy student.