SCHOOL BOARD OKS DRUG TESTING

The Branson School Board Approved A Drug Testing Policy Thursday That
Will Affect Hundreds Of Students.

The policy, which is planned to begin at the beginning of the
2006-07 school year, is random and will apply to students
participating in extracurricular activities. Students who drive to
school will also be considered part of the random-drug-testing pool.

School Communications Director Brenda Romine said the majority of
children 16 and above do drive to school.

"Those names of students who park cars on campus will be put into
the pool along with those in extracurricular activities and could
randomly be drawn," Romine said.

Superintendent Doug Hayter said the policy was not adopted to punish
students, but to encourage them not to use drugs.

"We really want to use this as a deterrent," Hayter said. "We're not
doing this just to catch children doing something wrong. We're
hoping that this will make them think twice about using drugs."

The policy will go into effect next year pending approval from the
Missouri School Board Association and school district attorneys. The
board initiated the idea of random drug-testing in October. A task
force of students, teachers and administrators from the
intermediate, junior high and high schools met late last year to
make the drug-testing recommendations.

A representative of the company that will conduct the testing,
Employee Screening Services, said employees strive to respect
students' confidentiality and privacy "in a non-humiliating way."

"When a student comes in to be tested, we don't know their name,"
Operations Manager John Throckmorton said. "We only know them by an
ID number. We try to casually speak to kids before the test and put
them at ease.

"We treat them very similarly to how we do employees when we test
them. We pat them down to make sure they're not carrying anything in
with them, but we don't stand in there and watch them or anything."

The company also conducts drug testing for the school district's bus
drivers, as well as students and employees from other schools in
southwest Missouri.

School board members have volunteered to be the first to take part
in the drug testing.

"We have had a lot of support from the community and I feel like
this is a policy that will be a positive impact in our school
system," Hayter said.