RANDOM TESTING NO WAY TO CURB STUDENT DRUG USE

On a recent trip to Atlanta, John Walters, the nation's drug czar, urged
public schools to consider randomly testing students for illegal substances
as a deterrent against future addiction.

Dozens of schools around the country have implemented such programs for
students as a prerequisite for their participation in extracurricular
activities. Last summer, drug testing proponents got a boost from the U.S.
Supreme Court when Justice Clarence Thomas, speaking for the majority,
called the policy "a reasonably effective means of addressing legitimate
concerns in preventing, deterring and detecting drug use."

It sounds good and, after all, who wouldn't want to curb drug use in
schools? But there's a big problem with that approach: It simply doesn't work.

A comprehensive new study has found that drug use was just as common in
schools that tested their students as schools that didn't. Of the 76,000
students surveyed by University of Michigan researchers, 37 percent of
12th-graders who attended schools with random drug tests said they smoked
marijuana last year, compared with 36 percent of students in schools that
didn't conduct tests.

Likewise, 21 percent of high school seniors in schools with random drug
screening programs said they had tried heroin or cocaine, while 19 percent
of their peers who tried those substances attended schools where no tests
were done.

The federally financed study concluded that, regardless of grade level or
the drugs in question, testing was a woefully ineffective, and often
expensive, remedy. A typical drug screen costs about $10 to $30 per student.

But there are other reasons that requiring every student who plays on the
football team, marches in the band or sings in the glee club to submit to
random drug tests is a bad idea.

In spite of the Supreme Court ruling, constitutional questions remain about
whether such programs violate Fourth Amendment protections against unlawful
search and seizure. If, as the court asserts, it's reasonable to test some
students --- such as student athletes --- for drugs, the same illogical
case can be made for eventually testing all students. If that happens,
schools will cease to be places of hope and learning and be transformed
into armed camps where every student is a suspect.

And make no mistake, drug testing will have a deterrent effect --- but not
in the way Walters and other advocates might expect. A student already
dabbling in drugs who could benefit greatly from an extracurricular
activity probably won't sign up if it means facing a urine test that could
lead to disciplinary action.

Instead of pushing the fallacy of drug testing, Walters should be focusing
on expanding public education about the true dangers of drug abuse and
increasing the range of options for meaningful treatment and counseling. In
the meantime, schools should just say "no" to drug testing.