WORCESTER, Mass. - The Worcester Public Schools' Turn it Around program kept sophomore Janiah Goodwin from serving a 10-day suspension. 

"We were both in the bathroom and had hit a cartridge and got caught," Goodwin said. "Now, we are here for a second chance."

Goodwin is taking a drug education course after she was caught vaping during school. 

"This would be giving me a second chance to go back to my school and still get all my work done," Goodwin said. "The alternative would have made me go down hill from there."

School safety director Rob Pezzella said since the return to in-person learning, about 70 students have gone through the same program and most of them are there for the same offense. Pezzella said in just one day, more than five vaping devices were confiscated. 

“Students are in the bathroom during certain times of the day and you’re seeing the cloud of smoke,” Pezzella said. 

What You Need To Know

  • Worcester schools started the Turn it Around drug education program two years ago
  • Students caught violating the drug policy have the option to take the five day course or face suspension
  • Since the return to in-person learning, 70 students have been through the program and most of them were caught vaping during school hours
  • The program allows students to continue their school work, while learning about the dangers of drug use

The five-day program is an optional alternative to suspension and allows students to continue their school work. ​Pezzella said early education can limit further use. 

“Addicts who are dying from overdoses, they start usually with harmless drugs or they think, like alcohol, marijuana,” Pezzella said. “Then, it progresses to something more potent, and that’s when they are turning to prescription pills, heroin, fentanyl.”

Wednesday was Goodwin’s last day in the program and she said she has learned about affects of vaping she’s never even thought of.

“The program went really well. I didn’t think I was going to like it as much as I did,” Goodwin said. “Certain things that were like shown and told to me... I was like ‘wow.’”