DRUG-TESTING FOLLY

Government officials from Washington, D.C., gathered for a press
conference last week in a small, crowded classroom at the ACE
Community Challenge Charter School in Denver. In front of a
carefully coordinated backdrop of books and computers, they
announced that Denver School District 1 would be the first in
Colorado to institute a random student drug-testing program.

Television news cameras rolled as deputy drug czarina Bertha Madras
of the Office of National Drug Control Policy and Deborah Price,
assistant deputy secretary of the Department of Education, issued a
$150,000 federal grant to the charter school's principal in the form
of an oversized cardboard check.

You've heard of blood money; this was urine money.

The two political appointees hailed random urinalysis of students as
a sure-fire approach to deterring drug use in schools, and in true
Bush administration fashion they dismissed all evidence that
suggested otherwise.

In 2003, the National Institute on Drug Abuse funded the largest
study to date on such programs. Researchers examined 94,000 students
at 900 schools around the country and found that there was no
difference between levels of drug use at schools that test their
students and those that do not. The study concluded, "school drug
testing was not associated with either the prevalence or frequency
of student marijuana use, or of other illicit drug use."

According to one of the researchers, Dr. Lloyd Johnston of the
University of Michigan, "[Drug testing is] the kind of intervention
that doesn't win the hearts and minds of children. I don't think it
brings about any constructive changes in their attitudes about drugs
or their belief in the dangers associated with using them."

Nevertheless, Madras repeatedly defended the federal pee-pee peeking
program as a "public health response" despite the fact that the
American Public Health Association has taken a formal position
against random student drug testing. Other major organizations that
have spoken out in opposition include the National Education
Association, the American Academy of Pediatrics, the Association for
Addiction Professionals and the National Council on Alcoholism and
Drug Dependence, among others.

Some also fear there are harmful unintended consequences associated
with such programs. Students for Sensible Drug Policy, a national
student-based advocacy organization, has expressed concern that
students might turn to using more dangerous but less detectable
drugs. For example, traces of marijuana in someone's body can be
found up to 30 or more days after use, whereas alcohol,
methamphetamine, inhalants and prescription drugs leave the system
within just one to four days. They also worry that random drug
testing is an unwarranted invasion of students' privacy and breaks
down the bonds of trust between them and their parents, teachers and
school officials.

Despite all of the questions raised about the effectiveness of these
programs and the potential harm they present, the drug czar's office
continues to travel the country and recruit school officials to
apply for these grants from the Department of Education. More than
$40 million has been doled out for random student drug-testing
programs since 2003, and more cash-strapped school districts than
ever before are applying to the program in hopes of getting
at least some form of financial relief.

Some schools that have tried drug testing no longer bother applying
because their experience has demonstrated a more efficient and
effective way to address student drug use.

Take the Dublin, Ohio, school district for example. It was spending
$35,000 per year randomly drug testing about 1,500 of its
approximately 3,600 students, during which time only 11 tested
positive for drug use (that's about $3,200 per "positive" student).
The district canceled the program and used the savings to hire a
full-time drug abuse counselor who could provide prevention programs
that reached all of the students rather than just a random sample,
and in a much more cost-effective way.

Unfortunately, the ACE Charter School and Denver School District 1
will not have such flexibility. They will be required to use grant
funds solely for drug testing students, regardless of its
effectiveness, over the next three years. In other words, they are
officially stuck in the business of collecting our students' urine
and flushing our money down the toilet.