Gloucester County Public Schools will present "Synthetic Drugs—What Families and the Community Need to Know" beginning at 7 p.m. next Thursday, Jan. 31, at the T.C. Walker Education Center. The free program will be presented in cooperation with the county sheriff and commonwealth attorney’s offices.

The program will include information on Spice, a type of synthetic marijuana, and other designer drugs such as "bath salts." It will feature presentations by Maj. Ryan Cookson of the Gloucester Sheriff’s Office and Gloucester Commonwealth’s Attorney Holly Smith, followed by an opportunity to ask questions of them, Gloucester High School principal Tony Beverage, emergency room physician Dr. Sudershan Gupta and Rita Cargill Brown, Director of Student Services for GCPS.

Prior to the program, those attending may view related exhibits provided by the Virginia National Guard Counterdrug Task Force and the Virginia Prescription Monitoring Program beginning at 6:30 p.m.

"I’m really hoping people will turn out for this," said Cargill Brown. "It is so new and parents are unaware of the problems it causes. The schools know what to look for, but a lot of parents don’t know what to look for."

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