STUDENTS affected by gambling are a growing concern for the state government.
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So much so that the government recently launched the program Gambling and Young People, specifically targeted at school-aged children.
It is focused not only on teachers and school support staff being able to recognise the signs of a child struggling with a family member's addiction but also on students who may themselves be gambling.
The Education Department said it did not have figures of students affected by gambling.
Nationally, about 5 per cent of under-age people have gambled in some form or other such as footy tipping.
Teachers are trying to grapple with students affected by a parent's addiction that leaves little money to put food on the table, let alone get their child to school.
And modern technology coupled with social media websites like Facebook has been blamed for producing a new, younger generation of gambling addict with Las Vegas-style games.
The Gambling and Young People program consists of a series of videos and anti- gambling material that is being distributed to all schools around the state.
It was launched by Community Services Minister Cassy O'Connor, who said gambling affected more than the individual, with children and young people often the hardest hit.
"The most profound impact on young people is when there is problem gambling in the home which is creating family breakdown, poverty, not enough food on the table, and the young people can go out into their lives and into their school communities beset with depression, anxiety and self-esteem problems and all the stigma that's attached with having a poker machine addiction or any gambling addiction within the home," Ms O'Connor said.
"So the first impact on young people is when they are in effect the victims of gambling within the home.
"But what we're seeing in Australia increasingly is young people, under the legal gambling age of 18, who are having a foray into gambling and some of them are developing gambling problems and losing what little money they have and effectively setting out on their adult life with an albatross around their neck."
Ms O'Connor said she could not say whether gambling was worsening among young people, but the proliferation of different forms of it and particularly online betting was on the increase in the up to 30-year-old age group.
Education Department deputy secretary Liz Banks said schools had access to the National Safe and Supportive Schools Framework and the Tasmanian Curriculum's Health and Well-being syllabus for support.
For problems with gambling, phone the Gambling Helpline on 1800858858 or visit www.gamblinghelponline.org.au, www.knowyourodds.net.au/for- schools.