RANDOM DRUG TESTING SPREADS, ONE SCHOOL A WEEK

Concerns Can't Be Ignored, but Neither Can the Health of 1 Million Kids.

The scene: A busy high school corridor in Scottsbluff, Neb. Principal
Galen Nighswonger, who began a random drug testing program for his
students last fall, is standing around the corner from two boys and
overhears this conversation:

"You going to the party Saturday night?"

"Since they've been testing I'm not using, so I haven't been going."

"Yeah. I'm gonna go, but I'm not gonna do anything."

It sounds self-justifying, but Nighswonger insists this is the way it
happened. His story, and others like it, are worth listening to as
the debate over student drug testing continues to rage and an average
of one school a week adds a testing program.

In the past, we've supported random drug testing for safety workers
and athletes but have been doubtful about the intrusiveness, costs
and fairness of broad-based student testing. Those remain valid concerns.

But so do the societal costs of drug use, which -- like smoking --
almost always begins during the teen years. Federal figures show that
almost 5% of 12-to-17-year-olds abused or were dependent on an
illicit substance in 2005 -- more than 1 million kids.

The most popular illicit drug, marijuana, is more potent and
dangerous today than it was a generation ago. Yet months or years can
pass before even the most involved parents realize a child is using
drugs, by which time treatment is much tougher.

Drug testing in schools might close that gap. White House drug czar
John Walters says testing is the single most important step schools
can take, and it's becoming increasingly hard to dismiss
administrators who say that testing works for them and can be done
fairly cost effectively (Scottsbluff spends about $11,000 a year to
randomly test roughly a quarter of the student body).

By Walters' estimate, more than 1,000 high schools and middle schools
conduct random drug testing, less than 5% of the total. But the
practice has been around for long enough that many state courts have
approved it. The U.S. Supreme Court has twice carved out exceptions
to students' privacy rights to enable schools to test within strict
limits -- either students for whom there's "reasonable suspicion" of
drug use, or random tests of athletes and students who participate in
other extracurricular activities.

Students who turn up positive are typically barred from after-school
activities briefly and required to get counseling and another test.
Only the school, a drug counselor and parents find out; the point is
to treat this as a health problem, not a police matter.

Advocates of testing say it gives students a powerful reason to say
no to peer pressure -- just as that overheard conversation at
Scottsbluff High School suggests. Critics are just as passionate,
arguing that the tests are invasive and expensive, and that studies
show testing doesn't deter drug use. In truth, data conflict, and
both sides can point to studies that back their position.

What's missing is definitive research that would allow schools to
make confident decisions balancing costs against benefits. In
Scottsbluff, Nighswonger says he acted after the parent of a
meth-addicted student stood up at a school board meeting and begged
for help. Who hasn't known a parent like that -- frightened,
desperate, at wit's end?

Testing -- at the discretion of local districts, with the ability of
parents to opt out -- is a tool that might help, if only schools had
the facts to make a smart choice.