About 350 Hart district junior high students Tuesday were at Santa Clarita Activities Center for a Drug Free Youth in Town, or DFYiT, presentation on the dangers of alcohol and drug abuse.

The program gave about 50 students from each of the seven public Santa Clarita Valley junior high schools a chance to talk about their participation in the program, and a chance for students ask questions, while DFYiT officials talked about “Plus One,” the newest aspect of their campaign to keep students away from drugs and alcohol.

About 350 Hart district junior high students Tuesday were at Santa Clarita Activities Center for a Drug Free Youth in Town, or DFYiT, presentation on the dangers of alcohol and drug abuse.

“We’re trying to grow the program,” said Brad Albert, human services supervisor for the city of Santa Clarita. “And the plus one is very simply that we’re asking all existing DFYIT members invite one friend to come to the meetings, in essence doubling the number of students.”

The program has seen rapid growth in the last three years, he said, noting the number of members have grown from about 720 in the first year to 1,240 this year. The end-of-the-year goal is 2,000, he added.

After Santa Clarita Mayor Laurene Weste and Santa Clarita Valley Sheriff’s Station Capt. Roosevelt Johnson spoke with the DFYiT participants, the seventh- and eighth-grade students asked questions about marijuana legalization, why all drugs aren’t illegal and if e-cigarettes are really a healthier alternative, among other questions.

Marijuana is not legal in California, Johnson said. Decisions about drug legalization might be up to the voters, he said, but everyone has a choice, and marijuana use isn’t a good decision. E-cigarettes are not a healthy alternative, he said.

At the DFYiT meetings, students learn about REAL, which is a resistance technique meant to be the next generation’s answer to “Just say no,” Albert said.

The students are educated about how they can refuse, explain, avoid and leave, he said.

One of the aspects of the program is voluntary drug testing, which helps give kids an out, Albert said.

“‘Hey, I can’t, I’m getting drug-tested,’” is one of the “outs” shared with the students by the students in peer-led discussion, he said.

The program also has meetings for those who wish to participate at campuses throughout the Santa Clarita Valley at least once a month, said Dana Abel, a program specialist for the city of Santa Clarita.

The point of the meetings are to encourage the students to be peer leaders for each others, so they are comfortable and have the courage to do so, Abel said.

“We cover a topic at each meeting, and the topics include choices, drugs, like marijuana and alcohol,” Abel said. “We have a 10-minute presentation on that topic, then we create a discussion and then we do something fun like an icebreaker game for the kids to get to meet each other and kind of become that support group.”