The Other Side Of The Desk

ISSUE OF SCHOOL DRUG TESTING MORE COMPLEX THAN IT MAY SEEM

In recent weeks, the generally peaceful countryside of Athens County has
endured galvanizing debates addressing the legitimacy and necessity of drug
testing within Alexander Local School District. In fact, not since the
opening of Petland have I seen so many people so upset about a single issue.

The Alexander Local School Board, possibly sealing its collective fate in
the next election cycle, adopted a policy that requires students who engage
in athletics or cheerleading, or who drive to school, to undergo urine
testing for recreational drug use - i.e. marijuana and alcohol.

The ensuing controversy grew volatile as both sides delivered self-serving
proclamations like a drunk uses a lamppost: for support instead of
illumination. Most commonly, I've heard opponents describe drug testing as
an egregious violation of students' right to privacy.

As a matter of law - notwithstanding any discussion of the law's spirit -
public-school drug testing is NOT an infringement of civil liberties. In
Vernonia School District v. Acton (1995), the Supreme Court of the United
States upheld the constitutionality of random drug testing for students who
participate in sanctioned athletics.

In Board of Education v. Earls (2002), the Court expanded Vernonia to
include students who participate in any type of competitive extracurricular
activity.

The reasonableness of a drug test conducted in a public-school setting is
judged by "balancing the intrusion on the individual's Fourth Amendment
interests against the promotion of legitimate governmental interests"
(Vernonia). Accordingly, in both Vernonia and Earls, the Court balanced the
students' privacy interest against the school's responsibility to maintain
"discipline, health, and safety." In this regard, it's important to
understand that dating back to New Jersey v. T.L.O. (1985), a landmark case
concerning students' Fourth Amendment rights, the Court has recognized that
a student relinquishes certain privacy rights when he/she is entrusted to a
school for supervision.

Applying analogous logic to drug testing, the Court reasoned that a Board
of Education's general regulation of extracurricular activities -
regulation that is established to maintain "discipline, health, and safety"
- - diminishes the expectation of privacy among those students. Furthermore,
the "degree of intrusion" caused by the collection of a urine specimen
"depends upon the manner in which production of the urine sample is
monitored" (Vernonia). Although we have yet to hear specifics about
Alexander Local School District's methodology for collecting specimens, the
Court determined in both Vernonia and Earls that their means of obtaining
urine samples was minimally intrusive on the students' limited privacy
interest.

Now we've established the legal basis for drug testing.

Pragmatism, however, demands a higher standard than legality.

Most research shows that students who abuse recreational drugs are more
likely to drop out of school than drug-free students, inherently lowering
the druggie's earning power relative to his/her lifetime.

Most research also shows that drug testing can be an effective deterrent to
drug use. If logic prevails, drug testing should increase economic
wellbeing while decreasing dropout rates.

Furthermore, as Athens County Common Pleas Court employee Vicki Rhodes
said, "In the long run, (drug use) is costing the county money because
we're having to defend these kids, we're having to defend them as adults."
Recreational drugs are inextricably linked to delinquency and criminal
recidivism. For instance, drug use during early adolescence has an impact
on delinquency not only in early adolescence, but also in late adolescence
and young adulthood, according to the Journal of the American Academy of
Child & Adolescent Psychiatry.

Still, despite these general truths, individual school boards must assess
the desirability of drug testing their schoolchildren. By seeking some
degree of community consensus, a school can greatly increase its chances of
adopting a successful testing program.

And without sounding too presumptuous, I'll offer this comment: While the
Alexander Local School Board seems to have traveled all avenues necessary
for implementing policy, the alarming reaction to the program connotes
little community input.

Rather, we're left to believe there exists, in the words of Nixon, a
formidable "silent majority" that supports the policy.

Editor's note: Jon Peters is a junior in the E.W. Scripps School of
Journalism at Ohio University. He writes a bi-weekly column for The Athens NEWS.