VOLUSIA COUNTY, Fla. — School districts around Central Florida are reporting an increase in the number of students vaping on campus in 2024 compared to last year.

Volusia County schools in particular reported an 80% jump during a three-month period between 2023 and 2024.

For 15-year-old Jaylon Robinson, the first time he got his hands on a vape was when he was seventh grade.

“I walked to the bathroom and a friend of mine had offered me one and at first I had said no because it wasn’t the first time, I had turned one down,” he said. “I was like halfway back walking back to class, and I was like ‘you know what I kind of want to.’ So, I turned around, and I went back to the bathroom and he handed it to me and I hit it and that’s like what started the whole thing.”

He said at first it felt cool, since everyone around him was doing it at school. 

“Something that I thought looked cool and you know everyone was doing it, so I thought, why not?” Jaylon said.

But then he noticed things had started to change. He was running out of breath easily and wanted to stay inside to vape instead of spending time with friends and family. He was even bringing his vape to his church’s youth group meetings.

“This is like a real problem that I’m having, and this should not be happening, you know, and it’s just that’s when I realized I need to stop,” Jaylon said.

Jaylon went to his mom, Courtney, asking for help. 

“I immediately decided to offer support rather than to get angry,” she said. “Obviously, I was upset he made a bad choice like that, but I knew that he was going to need support because I had seen him go from someone who wanted to be around his family all the time to going to hiding in his room and hermitting and just worrying about where his next vape was going to come from.”

She pulled him out of school to help him fight his addiction, using nicotine patches and offering a support system at home far from the school where all his friends used to vape too. 

“Every one of my son’s vapes came from school, every single one of them,” said Courtney. “Unless he randomly found one on the side of the road (...) and I know he did that a couple times as well. That’s how strong this addiction is. He would pick up a vape off the side of the road and if it had liquid in it, he would do it.” 

Jaylon’s story is one of many across students in Volusia County, as school leaders recognize that vaping in schools is an issue that has gotten worse year after year.

“It’s an issue nationwide,” said Volusia County Schools spokesperson Greg Turchetta. “So, we’re doing everything and anything we can do to cut this down, because if you look at the data, you can see the number of incidents are climbing year by year by year.”

In the first three months of 2023, the district issued 289 referrals, compared to 521 this year during that same stretch.

“It’s out of control,” said Volusia County Sheriff Mike Chitwood. “You know, we partnered with the district. We have 141 vape alarms in the different schools throughout Volusia County. Our deputies try to educate these kids on the harmfulness of vaping.”

In August, the district will bring back the Drug Abuse Resistance Education, also known as the D.A.R.E. program. Turchetta said the district is also working with the State Attorney’s Office to roll out a new educational campaign in the fall. 

Sheriff Chitwood said the goal is to warn students about the dangers of a nicotine addiction – and warn of traces of other drugs being found in tests.

“If you get caught, and you are sentenced, you end up in the criminal justice system,” said Chitwood. “The judges are demanding that you participate in a urine test.”

Courtney says she hopes the district takes action soon to address this ongoing problem. 

“We need something real, and we need something now,” she said. “Because if we don’t do something now, it’s just going to get worse.”

District leaders said they are starting with educating the students about the dangers of vaping, but they say they need support from parents in addressing this issue. 

“Students are increasingly vaping flavored products, which mask the harshness of the large dosages of highly addictive nicotine, they are ingesting,” said Volusia County School Board Member for District 4 Carl Persis. “Since punitive measures have not reduced the number of students vaping, the board wants the district to have offending students engage in educational lessons.”