ACLU TO CHALLENGE DRUG TESTING FOR STUDENT ACTIVITIES

In a pointed challenge to a policy adopted by an increasing number of high
schools, the American Civil Liberties Union said it would file suit today
against an Oklahoma school district that administers drug tests to students
who want to participate in extracurricular activities such as chorus.

The U.S. Supreme Court refused last year, without comment, to hear a
challenge to a drug-test requirement for after-school programs at an
Indiana high school.

But the ACLU contends that the Tecumseh School District in Oklahoma has
gone a critical step further: Many extracurricular activities are tied to
courses during the regular school day.

Thus, according to the ACLU and the two teen-age plaintiffs it is
representing in the suit, anyone at Tecumseh High School who refuses to
submit to the urine test required for the choir, for example, would have to
drop the accompanying music course, which provides a credit for graduation.

And that, the ACLU argues, is a violation of a student's right to a public
education, as well as of Fourth Amendment protection against illegal search
and seizure.

Graham Boyd, a lawyer for the ACLU's National Drug Policy Litigation
Project, wrote in papers that the group intends to file that by "targeting
a group of students who are relatively unlikely to use drugs" and who are
participating in activities with "no physical danger," the district was not
addressing a "proven problem."

In filing a complaint in federal District Court in Oklahoma City against
Tecumseh, the ACLU says it is attempting to check a rash of tests for
illegal substances that, while largely accepted when applied to athletes,
have recently been applied to thousands of students involved in more
cerebral pursuits.

Individual school districts in Idaho, North Carolina and Wyoming, among
other states, have implemented similar policies for cheerleaders, language
club members and chess competitors in the last year, while other districts
in Wisconsin, South Carolina, Ohio and Florida are considering expanding
testing to nonathletes.

Proponents argue that an extracurricular activity is a privilege, not a
right, and should be open only to those who are demonstrably drug- and
alcohol-free.

As in other districts -- including Winston-Salem/Forsyth County -- the
policy in Tecumseh applies to "illegal and/or performance-enhancing drugs,"
including alcohol, marijuana and amphetamines.

Though the testing was random last year, when the policy began, students
were told to present samples before joining activities this year, said
Lindsay Earls, one of the two plaintiffs in the Oklahoma case.

The superintendent of schools referred all questions to the district
lawyer, who refused to answer any questions about the policy's implementation.