BUSH DRUG-TESTING PROPOSAL REVIVES LOCAL SCHOOLS' DEBATE

Jeff Programs Praised; Critics Doubt Efficacy

WASHINGTON -- President Bush's call to spend $23 million on testing
students for drug use has revived a debate over how well the program works
and whether it creates more problems than it solves.

The debate is playing out in Louisiana, where Jefferson Parish has garnered
national attention for its random drug testing; officials in Orleans Parish
have shelved a program that was launched two years ago.

In his State of the Union address Tuesday night, the president said random
testing has proved effective, and he called it "a tool to save children's
lives."

"The aim here is not to punish children," Bush said, "but to send them this
message: We love you, and we don't want to lose you."

But critics said random drug testing sends a different message to
teenagers: We don't trust you, and you aren't mature enough to make
decisions on your own.

So says the nonpartisan Drug Policy Alliance and the American Civil
Liberties Union, which have teamed up to block Bush's new initiative. They
plan to distribute their 28-page pamphlet, "Making Sense of Student Drug
Testing; Why Educators are Saying No," to 17,000 school officials nationwide.

'We know what works'

The booklet says testing is ineffective, expensive and erodes trust between
students, parents and school officials. It also says fear of testing may
discourage students from taking part in athletics or after-school
extracurricular clubs, the very kinds of activities that may deter drug
use. The Supreme Court said only student-athletes and those in
extracurricular activities can be legally tested.

"We know what works," said Marsha Rosenbaum, director of the educational
program Safety First, an offshoot of the Drug Policy Alliance. "It's
relationships and communication and taking responsibility for one's own
health. Across the board, suspicionless drug testing has the effect of
eroding trust. It takes responsibility away from students and puts a wedge
between parents, teachers and students."

According to estimates, fewer than 5 percent of the school districts
nationwide randomly test students for drug use. Jefferson Parish runs one
of the broadest drug-testing programs in the country.

Athletes in all Jefferson Parish public schools and those who take part in
"strenuous" after-school activities, such as band, cheerleading and
marching units of ROTC, are subject to random testing of their hair for
traces of marijuana, cocaine, methamphetamines, PCP and ecstasy. They are
not tested for alcohol or steroids. The tests, which cost $40 each, detect
past drug use for up to 90 days.

With a $600,000 federal grant, the parish recently expanded the program to
test sixth-, seventh- and eighth-graders who have been expelled and sent to
one of two "alternative schools" in the parish.

Positives not prosecuted

The program is administered through the office of District Attorney Paul
Connick Jr., but students who test positive aren't criminally prosecuted.
Instead, they are steered into a five-week parent-student counseling
program, during which the students are drug-tested three times. If they
fail, they are sent to a more intensive program.

"This is not a punitive thing," Connick said. "I don't know who is testing
positive. I don't want to know. I just don't want that kid ever to enter
the criminal justice system."

Connick said the program has driven down drug use. Last year, fewer than 2
percent of the students tested for drugs had positive results. Over the
past two months, a parish official said, none has. Among those expelled
students, between 25 percent and 30 percent tested positive.

Scientific evidence about the effectiveness of student drug testing is
inconsistent. A 1999 study in Oregon found that drug use at a high school
with random testing of athletes was a quarter of what it was at another
school that didn't test. A University of Michigan survey of 76,000 students
nationwide published in April 2003 came to the opposite conclusion. It
found drug testing had no significant effect on the use of illicit drugs
among students or athletes.

Suspicions about testing

Connick's uncle, former Orleans Parish District Attorney Harry Connick, was
the driving force behind drug-testing students in southeast Louisiana. He
secured a $400,000 federal grant to begin hair-sample testing but ran into
stiff resistance.

Marie Farve, president of the Orleans District Parent Teacher Association,
worked with Connick to get drug-testing in New Orleans. She said their
efforts were met with hostility.

Even after parents had agreed to drug testing at G.W. Carver and Frederick
Douglass senior high schools, the School Board blocked it, she said.

"It was stopped with the promise that the school system would do its own
testing," Farve said. "It never happened."

Orleans Parish District Attorney Eddie Jordan, who succeeded Connick last
year, said school officials and some parents were skeptical of the
drug-testing program.

"There were suspicions about the motives of his office in doing the
testing," Jordan said. "Parents were not sure what would come of the
results and the accuracy of the testing, especially as it relates to
African-American children."

Minutes of an Orleans Parish School Board meeting in 2002 reflect concerns
that the hair of African-American students, who make up a majority of the
student body in the parish, would produce more false positives than that of
Caucasian students.

Grant mostly for Jeff

Jordan also raised concerns that Harry Connick chose the Massachusetts
company Psychemedics Corp. to do the testing without putting the contract
out to bid. According to Jordan, the grant money Connick secured was
earmarked for Jefferson Parish and two parochial schools in New Orleans,
not the Orleans Parish public school system.

"I was appalled to hear that it was for Jefferson Parish primarily," Jordan
said.

Parochial schools have more legal leeway to test students, and several in
the metropolitan area have had programs for years. De La Salle High School
conducts random hair-sample tests of all students. Jordan's son graduated
from the school, and the district attorney signed a permission slip that
permitted him to be tested.

"I thought it would be good to know if my son was involved, and he would
have the proper follow-up if there had been a problem," Jordan said.

The school's Web site says false positives from secondhand smoke and the
"coarseness" of African-American hair are "negligible." If students fail
the test once, they get counseling. If they fail again, they are asked to
leave.

The Jefferson Parish program hasn't been entirely free of controversy. Last
year, 130 students rebelled against the giving hair samples by shaving
their bodies. The students were forced to provide urine samples instead,
and the School Board adopted a new policy.

Student-athletes are now required to have a minimum amount of hair if they
want to be on a team. School officials call the policy "No hair, no play."