Medfield Police Chief, Schools Superintendent Seek Town-Wide Engagement on Teen Behavior

Reason suggests that when you are faced with an overwhelming situation like a party that wasn’t meant to be, you should call the police for assistance in sorting things out.

“Indeed you should,” said Chief Robert E. Meaney Jr. in a recent interview, “because that’s what we’re here for.”

In my case, I didn’t call, but my neighbors did.

The chief nodded with understanding as he listened to my story about a difficult night.

“You did what you could,” he said. “This business of swarming into parties unasked is what is happening these days in all our towns. And drinking and pot-smoking go along for the ride, too. We are finding that the laws now in place about the use and possession of marijuana are laughable when it comes to prosecution; there’s no bite in them, no ultimate price to pay. People, kids especially, are figuring that sooner than later, marijuana use will be legal, like cigarettes, so why not jump the gun if there’s no certain penalty?”

Meaney didn’t want to center everything on alcohol or drug use, he said; party-crashing like the one at my house, has been happening since forever because teenagers of all inclinations will always be on the lookout for opportunities to spread out their range of activities and they can conjure up a huge gathering almost instantly using social media.

Meaney cited a few recent cases where his officers had to escort teens found with alcohol and marijuana in vehicles back to the station where their parents were called to pick them up. In one instance, he said with a shake of the head, a young man, knocked out cold from too much alcohol, had been left by his friends sprawled on the railroad tracks until one of them came to his senses and called the police.

The best thing parents can do, Meaney said, is take responsibility for their own children, keep in touch with other parents, know what their kids are up to, including heading off to “parties,” be watchful about signs of drug and alcohol use when partygoers descend on their homes and call at the first sign of concern. Or maybe ahead of time if parents are involved in planning a party.

Meaney noted that he and other community members, notably Superintendent of Schools Bob Maguire and his team of administrators, teachers, counselors and outreach workers as well as members of the clergy and a number of parents, have never stopped trying to deal effectively with the issue of teenage misbehavior across Medfield.

Maguire clearly has an interest in how he and his colleagues in the schools can help deal with the larger issues of carousing and overdrinking by teenagers who view casual drug use matter of factly.

“Our students know better,” said Maguire in an interview. “They know there are consequences, personally and otherwise to their actions. Our school system has a comprehensive educational health advisory program that begins in kindergarten and runs right through senior graduation time. One sad factor to consider here is how longtime relationships are shattered when one friend decides to party and imbibe freely and the other decides to play by the social rules. As always, peer pressure comes into play, and I have talked with students eager to tell me how upset they are with how some of their classmates are acting in town.”

Maguire notes that “I have been at this a long time, as a teacher and administrator and often hear concerns about the stress we put our kids under and how that might be an issue in this acting out by some of them. Sure stress is there, but it’s just a component; partying and drinking on the sly is how kids have fun away from the stresses at home and in school. The parties are important to them and the planning for the next weekend, when parents can be so easily surprised, begins every Monday morning.”

There is a group in town that meets from time to time operating under the acronym MCAP (Medfield Cares about Prevention), said Maguire. “The idea is to get key constituencies around a single table where we can freely discuss these issues and maybe set up sub-groups that will home in on various element of the effort to stem the ongoing over-partying and the abuse of drugs and alcohol by some of our teenagers.

"What we struggle with is finding a surefire way to get more parents to engage with those parents already working with us, and to get students involved, too. After all, they certainly have perspectives to share with us that can be very useful.”

As one parent said to me, “our town isn’t falling apart and we are all intent on raising good kids. But they are still kids, and they too easily can find themselves in peer situations where they don’t have the time or the judgment to parse those settings where things can go very wrong very quickly.”

Getting to a town-wide engagement to help our teens to think things through when they find themselves facing quick decisions of "yes" or "no" to a drink or a hit of marijuana is what Meaney and Maguire will be working to bring about as the new year breaks in.