DRUG TESTING MAY NOT DETER STUDENTS

DMN-Study Says Use Is About Same At Schools That Screen, Don't Screen

Study Finds No Sign That Testing Deters Students' Drug Use

Drug testing in schools does not deter student drug use any more than doing
no screening at all, the first large-scale national study on the subject
has found.

The United States Supreme Court has twice empowered schools to test for
drugs -- first among student athletes in 1995, then for those in other
extracurricular activities last year. Both times, it cited the role that
screening plays in combating substance abuse as a rationale for impinging
on whatever privacy rights students might have.

But the new federally financed study of 76,000 students nationwide, by far
the largest to date, found that drug use is just as common in schools with
testing as in those without it.

"It suggests that there really isn't an impact from drug testing as
practiced," Dr. Lloyd D. Johnston, a study researcher from the University
of Michigan, said. "It's 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."

The prevalence of drug use in schools that tested for drugs and those that
did not was so similar that it surprised the researchers, who have been
paid by the government to track student behavior for nearly 30 years and
whose data on drug use is considered highly reliable.

The study, published last month in The Journal of School Health, a
peer-reviewed publication of the American School Health Association, found
that 37 percent of 12th graders in schools that tested for drugs said they
had smoked marijuana in the last year, compared with 36 percent in schools
that did not. In a universe of tens of thousands of students, such a slight
deviation is statistically insignificant, and it means the results are
essentially identical, the researchers said.

Similarly, 21 percent of 12th graders in schools with testing said they had
used other illicit drugs like cocaine or heroin in the last year, while 19
percent of their counterparts in schools without screening said they had
done so.

The same pattern held for every other drug and grade level. Whether looking
at marijuana or harder drugs like cocaine and heroin, or middle school
pupils compared with high school students, the fact that their schools
tested for drugs showed no signs of slowing their drug use.

While it is possible that schools that imposed screening had had even
higher rates of use before, the researchers said that was extremely
unlikely because they controlled for behavioral factors normally associated
with substance abuse like truancy and parental absence.

"Obviously, the justices did not have the benefit of this study," said
Graham Boyd, a lawyer for the American Civil Liberties Union who argued the
case against drug testing before the Supreme Court last year. "Now there
should be no reason for a school to impose an intrusive or even insulting
drug test when it's not going to do anything about student drug use."

But other researchers contend that the urinalysis conducted by schools is
so faulty, the supervision so lax and the opportunities for cheating so
plentiful that the study may prove only that schools do a poor job of testing.

"That's like blaming antibiotics if you didn't take them properly, or
blaming the doctor who prescribed them," said Dr. Linn Goldberg, a
professor of medicine at Oregon Health and Science University, who
conducted a much more limited study on two Oregon high schools last year.
It found that intensive, Olympic-grade testing could reduce drug use.