LANCASTER COUNTY, S.C. — The Lancaster County School District is warning parents of a disturbing trend: some students bringing drugs to school, and they might be hard to spot.
Bryan Vaughn, the director of safety and transportation for the district, posted recent confiscations to Facebook.
"It's sad to see anything like this in our school system," Vaughn said. "We're seeing vapes that have been infused with THC, which makes them basically the equivalent of marijuana."
Vaughn said they've found marijuana cartridges appearing to be from out of state. Those cartridges were then likely brought into the area and sold.
MORE NEWS: CMS to begin testing unvaccinated staffers
"We actually had a confiscation in a school last week where we had about 30 of those cartridges that were taken off one individual," he said.
They've also confiscated what looks to be gum or candy but is actually wax containing high levels of THC.
"What they're doing is taking this wax and they're actually putting it in the fluid and it vaporizes and they're getting that high from that as well," Vaughn said.
It doesn't stop there. Vaughn said last week, they confiscated something he hasn't seen in the school system in his entire 28 years with the district.
"[We] confiscated last week some tattoo-looking items that actually were hits of acid," Vaughn said.
Vaughn said K9 units sniffed the drugs out during routine checks.
"We're going into classrooms, we're checking bookbags, we're checking lockers, we're checking vehicles," he noted.
Vaughn said having a vape on campus could result in a suspension, but drug possession could get students expelled.
"It's not a situation where we want to say, 'hey we got you'," he said. "I mean, we really truly want to keep these out of school and we want to really truly help our kids."
The district said they won't release specific school information as this does involve minors, but hopes parents will be on the lookout to protect their kids.
Contact Lana Harris at lharris@wcnc.com and follow her on Facebook, Twitter and on Instagram.