The government’s school behaviour adviser has called on headteachers to crack down on vaping among pupils, calling it “a huge health hazard” and an “enormous distraction”, amid reports that more children are using the devices, including some of primary age.
Tom Bennett said vaping was now as big an issue in schools as cigarettes once were, with children becoming “addicted to the practice and the chemicals involved”.
He called on school leaders to confiscate prohibited items, set clear sanctions and follow them through with zero exceptions.
Headteachers in England have described pupils being caught vaping in toilet blocks, and some being lured into dealing vapes in return for free ones.
Other children are frightened to go to the toilet because of the illicit vaping going on, and learning is being disrupted as pupils sneak off for a quick vape between lessons, making them late for class.
Heads say it is primarily older children in secondaries who are vaping, though some have heard from colleagues in primary schools of incidents involving younger children.
In Blackpool, the Conservative councillor Andrew Stansfield recently told a full council meeting that vaping was “rife” in the town’s schools, and estimated that 75% of students were vaping. It is illegal in the UK to sell vaping products to under-18s.
In Devon, Amy Grashoff, the headteacher at Newton Abbot college, has seen a marked increase in the number of students vaping. She is also aware of cases of children selling vapes on behalf of older children or family members, who can then find themselves chased over debts.
The school has introduced measures to tackle the problem, including searches using metal detector wands, CCTV, limiting the number of students in a toilet at one time, and keeping outer doors to toilet blocks open to reduce antisocial behaviour.
“You can find yourself spending an awful lot of time dealing with inappropriate behaviour in the toilets when you should be in lessons watching the 95% of our students engaging enthusiastically in their learning,” said Grashoff, who is worried about the health implications for children.
Glyn Potts, the headteacher at Newman RC college in Oldham, said his school saw a spate of vaping incidents about three years ago, but the introduction of CCTV had reduced the problem. Pre-Covid it was a weekly occurrence, he said; last year there were just eight or nine incidents involving vapes.
“They are easy to use, hide and store. We’ve seen vapes where there’s a vape at one end and a memory stick at the other, clearly targeted at the student market,” Potts said. He said there was also a competitive, gaming element to vaping that was appealing to young people, with some trying to create elaborate smoke rings.
Sean Maher, the headteacher at Richard Challoner school in New Malden, Surrey, said a pupil caught vaping on site would get an automatic two-day exclusion.
Ben Davis, the head at St Ambrose Barlow RC high school in Swinton, Manchester, said he tried to take a health-promoting approach.
“It’s quite stealthy. It’s possible to do it in a crowded corridor and no one notice,” he said. He was aware of cases where adults outside school were giving children free vapes as a way of grooming them.
Bennett told the Guardian: “Vaping is now as big an issue in schools as cigarettes were. They’ve moved in and partially replaced that.
“Part of it is symbolic, it’s a signal of what they believe to be maturity, possibly even rebellion, and as such it presents the same dilemmas.
“Kids are becoming addicted to both the practice and the chemicals involved. It’s a huge health hazard, and it presents an enormous distraction to children in schools when they should be socialising, learning and growing.”
He said schools should teach students why vaping is bad for them, and make them aware that it is prohibited and the consequences for students who vape on school premises.
“This isn’t some peevish piety. Schools need to be spaces where children are protected from narcotics of all forms, and being stringent with these processes is necessary to guarantee that children are looked after,” he said.
“They’re vulnerable to predatory influences from the media about premature adultification, to businesses wanting to sell addictive products to a young market, and to their own immaturity. That’s why schools need to set these boundaries – because they care.”
Recent research by NHS Digital found that more than one in five (21%) 15-year-old girls used electronic cigarettes in 2021, more than double the proportion recorded in 2018 (10%). The proportion of girls who vape was seven points higher than the proportion of boys of the same age.
