SHELBY DROPS BLOOD TESTING

The Shelby County Board of Education has revised its new student drug
testing procedures to eliminate blood testing and better protect the
privacy of students undergoing drug tests.

School officials made the changes after one parent, Michele Trachy
Zaragoza, opposed the policy approved in June, saying it would violate her
daughter's privacy and was too broad in its scope.

The changes will apply both to students who participate in extracurricular
activities, including athletes, and those who park on campus.

"I really feel better about it," county school Superintendent Evan K. Major
said of the revised procedures. "I think we have a better document now
because we have gone through this process."

The board last month adopted a policy requiring students who park on campus
to sign a waiver subjecting them to random drug tests. Since then, Trachy
Zaragoza has met with two lawyers, contacted the American Civil Liberties
Union and filed complaints with the U.S. and state departments of education.

"It became very evident that the policy was not constitutional," she said.
"I don't think it would have gotten through a court of law."

The previous waiver allowed school officials to subject students to blood
testing in addition to taking urine, hair or breath samples. School
officials on Thursday struck the blood-testing option.

"That probably should have never been in there," Major said. It had been
carried over from previous drug testing procedures and, while the school
system has never used blood testing, the option stayed in place until now,
Major said.

The waiver for students who park on campus originally allowed test results
to be released to the school board, the medical review officer, the drug
program coordinator and to school officials "who have a need to know." As
revised, it limits the school officials in the know to administrators.

Penalties for students who test positive are slightly less specific in the
new policy. For example, those testing positive formerly had to undergo at
least seven weeks of an outpatient drug treatment program. The revised
document states instead that the students must "participate in substance
abuse counseling" approved by the drug program coordinator; no minimum
length of treatment is stated.

"Counseling can take many forms," Major said. While a student would still
be barred from participating in extracurricular activities, sports or
parking on campus for seven weeks after the first offense, the language in
the revised policy allows for greater flexibility in terms of drug
treatment, he said.

Another change gives students taking prescribed or over-the-counter
medications a break. Those students can submit "a confidential writing" to
the drug testing agency, before or after a test, detailing any medicines
they may be taking.

In several places, school officials added phrases that stressed efforts to
keep student drug test results confidential. The document states that
"information regarding any positive drug test shall be kept in confidential
files, separate from other educational records of the student."

While she's pleased with the changes, Trachy Zaragoza said she still has
reservations about the policy. "I don't think they're going to be able to
prove that this is going to be able to keep kids off drugs," she said.
Plus, she added, "How are they going to pay for this?"

The school system has budgeted $95,000 for drug testing, according to its
proposed 2004 budget; in 2003, it allotted $65,000.

While students in athletics and extracurricular activities and students who
park will be subject to random drug tests, they won't all be tested, Major
said. "The bottom line is we couldn't afford to test every child who drives
to school," he said.

Board member Trey Ireland, a lawyer who helped draft the revised
procedures, said the revisions don't change the intent of the testing. "By
tightening and narrowing the language, it makes the policy stronger so that
it could withstand scrutiny," he said.