pom_uk

Having just watched this programme it concerned us (with two young sons) that the eldest son commented that everyone in his year was a pot user i.e. smoked marajuana. Whilst I accept that drugs are available everywhere can anyone comment on whether the situation is any worse in Oz than in the UK ??

wengerboy

i am currently contracting in surrey with a lad from melbourne who informed me that while pot is readily available almost anywhere in oz class A cat drug dealing or possesion or smugglig carries far harsher penalties than blighty ,thusfore pushing up the price and limiting availability! please note only a view expressed by a friend but more educated than moi:lecture:

bondipom

Marijuana and Heroin use are widespread in OZ. Hemp grows in the climate and is locally produced at high quality but not much lower prices. Heroin comes in from Burma and Afghanistan (sometimes courtesy of the North Korean Government) and use is set to rocket now the US "controls" Afghanistan.

Cocaine use is much lower and the other drugs are probably used just as much.

There are more important influences on your children's likelyhood of taking drugs. These include the immediate peer group and how well educated they are in the effects of drugs.

Grayling

Hi
I work in the Mental health services in UK and have had a lot of contact with Australian services.Drug use is quite rife and certainly seems more 'open' than here.
There are also massive problems with alcohol in some areas

G

dotty

There was a thread on drugs here a while ago, perhaps if you type in a few drug names it will come up? Smoking pot in OZ is very big, I have always found it really annoying, people seem bored, lethargic and then add to that by becoming stoned. However I cannot say that kids at high school are particulary stoned or anything, not in class time, most schools would pick up on that pretty quick.

However despite the opinion on this board sometimes that bringing kids to OZ, will turn them into healthy bare footed frolicking fresh air lovers, rest assured all the normal teen hormones come out in OZ too. Teenage sex is the big one, most 15 year olds are probably getting more sex than us, I am serious they get at it really young here. Most have tried a smoke but doubt very much that all of them take it up, depends on the kids nature. Most have to have cars by 17 to survive lack of public transport which gives them a big opportunity to do a lot of stuff you dont really know much about. I would take a guess the likely hood of your kids turning to drugs is the same as in the UK, USA, Canada or anywhere else, probably more to do with the personality than the availabiltiy. Dont stress.

cherry6

Hey, but at least the Australian standard of education is better than the UK one!

dotty

OMG are you trying to wind people up!

cherry6

No, I am referring to the comment made on tv tonight that Australian standards of education are higher than the UKs.

dotty

It must be true then

cherry6

Why Study in Australia?

Australia’s education standards rank amongst the highest in the world.
Australian qualifications are widely recognised and accepted.
Australia has multiple institutions offering a wide variety of courses with flexible delivery methods.
Government legislation and codes of conduct operate to regulate the industry and protect students.
Educational facilities and teaching resources are of high quality.
Competitive tuition fees and the low cost of living combine to represent good value for money.
Australia offers an attractive lifestyle, favourable climate, safe and politically stable environment, exotic landmarks and wildlife, friendly people.
Overseas students are welcome in Australia’s multicultural society.
Networks of support exist to help students in all aspects of their stay in Australia.
There are opportunities to travel and/or work whilst studying.

Taken from http://www.admissionguru.com/article...daustralia.asp

dotty

Overseas students pay large fees to support many of our Universities, without them they would collapse, OZ kids only pay $5000 + a year thanks to them. Hence the upmarket banter perhaps

cherry6

Britain's drop-out rate between school and work is one of worst in industrialised world

Britain has one of the worst records in the industrialised world for getting young people successfully from school into work, according to the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD). It has a poor record for drop-out rates from education and for the quality of much of its young workforce. Out of the 14 countries studied in depth, only Hungary and Portugal had a record as poor as the UK.

A wider study involving all 29 members of the OECD found that only in four countries – Spain, Hungary, the UK and Mexico – did 20% or more of young people drop out of education within a year of the end of compulsory schooling.

In addition, there was no trace of 10% of young people who found their way into neither work nor training after leaving education. The number of young people "at risk" was the worst in the OECD alongside Portugal.

The data the report is based on relates mainly to the years of the Conservative Government. The report notes that steps have been taken to remedy the UK's deficiencies, but suggests there is still much to be done. The OECD comments that Britain would benefit from a "more qualitative, less mechanistic and bureaucratic" form of steering young people from school to work. A young person leaving school could be caught in a tangle of public and private bodies all supposedly there to help. This includes 150 local education authorities, 100 training and enterprise councils, more than 400 further education colleges and 1000 job centres as well as some local regeneration partnerships and the chambers of commerce network. It criticised the private-sector-led system for delivering vocational training that Labour inherited. Moreover, the payments by results system encouraged "providers to focus upon maximising the number of lower level qualifications."

One result was that 40% of British young people aged 19 to 24 had not reached what the OECD considered to be a minimum level of qualification.

http://www.literacytrust.org.uk/data...dinternat.html

cherry6

Sadly, it doesnt matter how great the education system is in any country, if you are thick there is no hope

Florida_03

Drugs...no way...anyway here's the lights of Morayfield as viewed from the Morayfield Skate Park any night of the week.

dotty

Watch out for the thick then! in OZ a grad earns less than a man with a hammer, or a bag of cement, best paid worker is a miner, thick only in the wallet perhaps