Drug Abuse Resistance Education

Drug Abuse Resistance Education, or D.A.R.E., is an education program that tries to prevent use of controlled drugs, membership in gangs, and violent behavior. It was founded in Los Angeles in 1983 as a joint initiative of then-LAPD chief Daryl Gates and the Los Angeles Unified School District^[1][2] as a demand-side drug control strategy of the American War on Drugs.

The program was most prominent in the 1980s and 1990s. At the height of its popularity, D.A.R.E. was found in 75% of American school districts and was funded by the US government. The program consists of police officers who make visits to elementary school classrooms, warning children that drugs are harmful and should be refused. D.A.R.E. sought to educate children on how to resist peer pressure to take drugs. It also denounced alcohol, tobacco, graffiti, and tattoos as the results of peer pressure.

A series of scientific studies in the 1990s and 2000s cast doubt on the effectiveness of D.A.R.E., with some studies concluding the program was harmful or counterproductive. Years after its effectiveness was cast into doubt, the program remained popular among politicians and many members of the public, in part because of a common intuition that the program ought to work. Eventually, in the early 2000s, funding for the program was greatly reduced.

The program distributed t-shirts and other items branded with the D.A.R.E. logo and with anti-drug messages. These items were repurposed by drug culture as ironic statements starting in the 1990s.

Its American headquarters is in Inglewood, California. D.A.R.E. expanded to the United Kingdom in 1995. The program's mascot is Daren the Lion.