IF STUDENTS SMELL OF POT, OUT THEY GO

Dartmouth High School students have been warned: if they come to school
even smelling of marijuana, they will be kicked out of class for five days.

If they are caught a second time with the scent of weed on their person,
they will be sent home for the rest of the year.

Principal Phil Legere said he made the announcement over the public address
system last Wednesday because drug use among high school students is a
problem, and interferes with their ability to learn.

"There's nothing unusual in either the story, or the concern. I would say
that it's a problem in any high school, and there's no doubt in my mind
whatsoever that it (marijuana smoking) interferes with students' learning,"
he said in an interview.

"You know, students who are under the influence are definitely more
lethargic, and I think there are a lot of studies that would prove that it
interferes with short-term memory."

Legere said the decision to suspend a student will be based on whether
teachers can smell drugs on a student.

"If you smell it, you smell it ... I would say that it's in the
jurisdiction of any principal to suspend students for using drugs or
alcohol during school hours," he said.

Legere said it's possible that a student could smell like marijuana smoke
simply by standing near someone else who is smoking, but that wouldn't
necessarily protect them from suspension.

"But, that's a discretionary thing. There's no witch hunt, we're just doing
what we normally would do, trying to curb things that are a negative
influence on students' learning."

Grade 12 student Mike Landry said many students thought Legere's
announcement was "pretty funny; pretty authoritarian."

Landry acknowledges that some students are coming to school stoned, but it
will be difficult to prove if someone has been smoking dope just using the
smell test.

"It makes no sense. Apparently, they'll be able to tell (if students smell
of marijuana), so they say," he said sarcastically.

Landry, who co-authors The Zine with two other Grade 12 students, said they
will make fun of the principal's edict in the next edition of their magazine.

"It's a big joke. We're going to treat it like the Communist witch hunt,
see how that goes over," he said.

Civil rights lawyer Walter Thompson said, in principle, the school has a
legitimate interest "in keeping itself free of people with intoxicants."

But, school administrators should be "pretty damn sure, just in fairness to
the child," that they can actually smell marijuana, he said, and there
should be some mechanism for students to explain themselves.