During the last year they have run through an abbreviated SWAT team physical fitness test, learned how business gets done at the FBI’s offices in Honolulu and, for a culminating project, created an anti-drug campaign.
They aren’t agents in training, though some of them might be one day.
They are 135 Waipahu High freshmen who were the first to go through a revamped FBI adopt-a-school project for Hawaii, complete with a curriculum that included the kind of ethics and decision-making training Honolulu police cadets receive.
The FBI program was designed to get students at one of the state’s biggest high schools — one with a dropout rate of 23 percent last year — to think more about their responsibilities as students and what opportunities they have after high school.
At a gathering yesterday, participating students unveiled their anti-drug campaign, "Smoke Only Oxygen," which will be distributed to high schools statewide.
The campaign uses word-of-mouth messages between students to warn teens about the dangers of drugs.
Tyler Enos, 15, thought up the anti-drug initiative’s slogan. It came to him, he said, as he tried to think about a catchy and cool way to tell his friends that drugs will destroy their lives.
The message he wants to get across: "Don’t let others peer-pressure you."
Kayla Viernes, 15, and Allison Tai See, 14, said working on the "Smoke Only Oxygen" campaign was fun because it was student-designed, from start to distribution. (The initiative has a website, smokeonlyoxygen.com.)
"It’s a voice for Waipahu’s community, for us to be better leaders and make the right choices," said Viernes.
Tai See rattled off some of the activities students have participated in since last fall: a team-building ropes course, the physical fitness test, a leadership seminar and the visit to FBI offices downtown.
"We got to see a human skull," she said.
The FBI hopes to remain at Waipahu High next school year, and wants to continue mentoring this year’s group of freshmen all the way to graduation day.
"My big goal is to get these kids to the graduation podium," said FBI Special Agent Arnold Laanui Jr. "I want to be there with 135 leis."
The FBI has long been mentoring students through its adopt-a-school program, but the Honolulu office dramatically ramped up efforts this school year at a time when education reform plans are under way statewide.
Laanui said one class centered on Internet safety and cyberbullying. Several covered ethics training, similar to the lessons Laanui teaches at the HPD academy.
"It’s kind of a peer education model," said Laanui, who added that the students came up with the distribution method on their own. He’s hopeful about the results.
"Teens don’t listen to mommies and daddies as much as they do to friends," he said.
