Educators

Whether you are a primary school, secondary school or sixth form college you have a role to play in ensuring vaping isn’t taken up by Under 18 year old students.

Adolescents in particular have, and always will, experiment with things as it’s part of the growing up process. As kids for years have tried smoking and alcohol, so they are doing so with vaping.

Whilst vaping has been evidenced by Public Health England as being considerably less risky than smoking and its regular use amongst 11-18 year olds remains very low, it’s key that the issue of vaping use within schools is addressed particularly as there is evidence of young people getting their hands on disposable vapes.

Here are some tips drawing on best practice activities put in place by the education sector to tackle vaping
take up by schoolchildren.

Develop a school-wide vaping policy that integrates with a wider, healthy school strategy covering also for example mental wellbeing and sex and relationships education. The policy’s development should be created in consultation with staff and students;
Apply the vaping policy to everyone who comes onto the school’s premises, including the grounds of the site;
Ensure the policy is widely publicised and accessible for everyone to view;
Make information and resources on vaping available to staff and students;
Engage peers in the education process on vaping as adolescents warm to this group rather than an authority figure;

Support parents to have productive conversations with their children who are found to be vaping;
Prepare youngsters to deal with peer pressure resulting from not vaping;
Establish an anonymous reporting system on the school premises which enables children to reveal the identity of an individual who is vaping and/or a retail outlet which is selling vape products to minors;
Use clear referral pathways into school nursing and counselling, early help and voluntary sector services and youth workers.

Schools and colleges also have a key role in reporting retailers that they suspect of selling vapes to students. If suspicious, please report the retailer with any evidence to your local Trading Standards officer who can be found here.

If children report adverse health conditions that they suspect being caused by vaping, please report these to the Medicines and Healthcare products Agency (MHRA) via its Yellow Card scheme.

Schools and colleges can also check here whether vape products have been successfully notified to the MHRA, and therefore their legitimacy, if concerned it is a non UK compliant product or counterfeit.

Educators

Here are some tips drawing on best practice activities put in place by the education sector to tackle vaping take up by schoolchildren.

Here are some tips drawing on best practice activities put in place by the education sector to tackle vaping
take up by schoolchildren.