This is the seventh of eight write-ups from freshman students at Manual Arts High School. Some participated in weeks-long projects about animal abuse, drugs, gangs, prostitution and racism. Part of their projects included surveys they created for their communities. After they gathered information, all of the groups presented their findings at a school presentation. Two days later, each group wrote about their experiences during an Intersections: The South Los Angeles Report mentoring and writing workshop.

We chose drugs and drug dealing because it is something that really affects our communities, and we have experienced it in our lives with friends and family. It is also one of the biggest things going around in our communities. Our group was asked to research and interview people to see the different perspectives about this topic.

Our interviews included our teachers and people from community organizations. We also did plenty of research about the topic. We handed out surveys at the senior quad on campus and around the lunch area. When people walked by, we gave them the surveys and had a conversation.

What we have learned is that you can stop the use of drugs, but you cannot stop them from existing. And even though you can tell people not to do drugs, some of them will not listen to what you are trying to tell them. We also learned that drugs will always exist in life, and that we can help you, but it is your choice to see if you want to stop selling or using drugs.

We observed that most of the students at Manual Arts High School do drugs, and they felt that if they told us they smoked weed, we would tell the counselors. We told them not to put their names on the surveys because we wanted their answers to be completely confidential. We told them to be real about their answers and not to lie because their names would not go on it anyway.

One other thing our group learned is that a lot of people have not used any type of drugs, but they would like to try it some day.