LOCAL SCHOOL DRUG TESTING A SUCCESS?

Cache County School District's student drug testing program just
finished its first year, and district and school officials say it's
good but not perfect.

The number of students who tested positive for drugs was astoundingly
low - so low, in fact, that officials believe some students are
cheating the system.

Managing and coordinating drug tests for hundreds of students created
a huge increase in work for the schools' athletic directors, with no
increased pay.

In coming years, school and district staff hope to iron out some of
these problems, with the help of a new $135,000 grant from the federal
government for the program.

The program means extra work and cost, but it's worth it if it can
prevent drug use and help kids who have a problem, said Jim Crosbie,
athletic director at Mountain Crest High School.

"I grew up in this community," Crosbie said. "I love this valley and I
think the kids here are good kids, but sometimes we turn a blind eye
to things. Sometimes we convince ourselves that everything's OK."

The Reasons

The district first began considering a drug testing program after
hearing complaints from parents and athletes that students involved
with the high schools' athletic programs were using drugs.
Administrators and the district's board of education considered
implementing a testing plan for months until finally giving it the OK
in April 2007. The district provided $30,000 for the program, as well
as raising participation fees to cover the costs, Liechty said.

"In our district, it was driven by athletes and parents calling for
it," said Sky View athletics director Jan Hall.

According to the text of the policy, it has three objectives. The
first is to protect the health and safety of students. A student
participating in a school activity while under the influence of drugs
or alcohol is a danger to him or herself, as well as other students
taking part, the policy reads.

The second reason for the program is to serve as a deterrent of drug
and alcohol use, said Mike Liechty, deputy superintendent for the
district. Students might think twice about using illegal substances if
they are worried that they could get caught during a drug test.

"If we're approaching this to try to help kids and prevent them from
even starting, that's a great thing," Crosbie said.

The third reason for the program is to intervene in the lives of
students who are already involved with drugs. Parents and other
concerned adults will be alerted to problems and be able to provide
help, Liechty said. Also, students with drug or alcohol problems who
want to be involved in extra-curricular activities will have a
motivation to change, the policy states.

The Method

Every student who took part in an activity at Mountain Crest or Sky
View sponsored by the Utah High School Activities Association must
agree to submit to drug testing. That includes athletics, as well as
debate, competitive drama and music programs.

In the program's first year, every student who took part in an
activity had to be tested before being allowed to compete - except in
the case of students who had already been tested once for a different
activity. After the initial tests, 10 percent of all the students in
the programs were selected at random each week to be tested again.

The tests were administered by Bear River Health Department, which
sent personnel to the schools to collect urine samples. The samples
were then tested for 12 different substances, including alcohol,
marijuana, cocaine and a variety of prescription drugs. The level of
creatine in the sample was also tested.

If a test turned up positive for any substance, BRHD alerted the
school. If the test showed a student was on a prescription drug, that
student was required to verify that he or she had a prescription from
a doctor.

The program is non-punitive, which means law enforcement aren't
informed about positive test results and students who test positive
aren't suspended from school, Liechty said.

In the policy, a student who tests positive for an illegal drug or a
prescription drug for which he or she has no prescription is suspended
from two consecutive games, performances or competitions. To begin
competing again, the student must complete a substance-abuse
intervention program and provide a clean sample.

If that student tests positive again, he or she is prohibited from
taking part in the activity for the rest of the season and must
complete a treatment program before being allowed to compete in
another activity that year. If a student tests positive three times,
he or she is suspended from all activities for the whole year.

The Results

About 900 students were tested at Mountain Crest, with similar numbers
at Sky View, Crosbie said. In the program's first year, seven samples
tested positive at Sky View, said Athletic Director Jan Hall. Most of
those were related to medicines taken under a doctor's supervision,
but one student was suspended from participation for the rest of the
season after testing positive twice for illegal drugs.

At Mountain Crest, 15 samples tested positive, each time for
prescription drugs, Crosbie said. In each of those cases, the students
were able to verify that they had a prescription.

Brock Alder, director of the substance-abuse division at the Bear
River Health Department, said everyone involved was surprised at how
few tests turned up positive.

"I'm amazed," Alder told the district's board of education at an April
meeting. "I thought there'd be more positives. If these numbers are
accurate, man, you've got some good kids,"

The question is whether the tests really are accurate.

Most of the young people in the valley aren't using drugs, but those
who are may have learned how to beat the system, Crosbie said.

Several tests at both schools tested positive for low creatine levels.
Creatine is not a banned substance but occurs naturally in urine. A
low amount of creatine in a test sample may mean that a student is
deliberately trying to dilute the urine, thereby making it more
difficult to track illegal substances, Crosbie said.

"Chances are they either dipped the cup out of the toilet or filled it
in the sink so it was really diluted down," Crosbie said.

If a test shows low creatine levels, the student is required to test
again. In each of the cases of low creatine this year, the subsequent
tests were negative.

Challenges and Improvements

The biggest problem with the drug-testing program this year was that
it added more work without increasing resources, Liechty said. Hall
and Crosbie, the athletic directors at the schools, ended up taking
responsibility for tracking which students had been tested and finding
times to carry out all the tests.

The workload was especially heavy at the beginning of each season,
when new sports and activities were beginning, Crosbie and Hall said.
Every student needed to be tested before competing, which created a
huge workload that had to be completed in a small time.

For example, the Mountain Crest track team had 168 members this
spring. Coordinating with BRHD personnel to come to the school to
administer hundreds of tests took "an extreme amount of time," on top
of the time they spent preparing for and teaching classes, Crosbie
said.

"It definitely added to our duties and stresses," he
said.

A new federal grant recently awarded to the district will help combat
that problem, said Stacie Stewart, grant coordinator for the district.
The grant will give the district about $135,000 per year for the next
three years to help support and enhance the district's drug testing
program.

Part of that money will likely go toward paying someone to oversee the
testing at one or both of the schools, she said. If the athletic
directors choose to keep the responsibility, they will be paid to do
so, or the district will be able to pay somebody else to do it.

The workload will also be lightened if the board of education agrees
with the recommendations of the athletic directors and principals to
do away with the requirement that every student be tested once at the
beginning of the season. Testing everyone at the beginning of the
season allows students to prepare for the test to try to go
undetected, Hall said. Only doing random tests will be just as
effective because students will not know when to expect the tests, he
said.

The tests will also be more effective if the testing procedure is
changed to require someone to be nearby when a student is taking the
sample, Liechty said. When the testing policy was first created last
year it would have required students to be observed while providing
the urine sample to ensure they weren't putting anything into the
sample besides their own urine. That aspect of the policy was later
changed to reduce potential embarrassment to students.

Being unobserved allows students to cheat on the tests, Hall said.
Liechty said he plans to advise the board to change that portion of
the policy to make it so there is someone nearby while the test is
taken.

Has It Worked?

Though there have been some problems to work out, the program is
positive overall because it is an effort to help kids lead healthy
lives, Hall said.

Mountain Crest Principal Jack Robinson agrees. "It's a message that we
care about students' health and their safety and their welfare,"
Robinson said. "It's not about punitive action.

Crosbie became convinced of the value of the program early last school
year. BRHD personnel told Crosbie they had discovered traces of an
illegal substance in the urine sample of one of the Mountain Crest
athletes, but the amount of the substance was so small that it looked
like the student had probably stopped using it to avoid trouble with
his drug tests.

That is exactly the kind of result the people behind the program are
hoping for.