DRUG TESTING HAS NO IMPACT ON STUDENT DRUG USE, STUDY FINDS

While the US Supreme Court has twice okayed the drug testing of school
kids on the grounds that the invasion of their privacy is offset by
the role of drug testing in preventing drug use, the first major study
of the efficacy of drug testing in schools has found that it just
isn't so. In fact, the study found that drug use is as frequent in
schools with testing as in schools without it. The findings, which
every activist faced with a proposal to institute school drug testing
should have in hand, are a serious blow to the rationale behind school
drug testing.

The federally-financed survey of 76,000 students and 891 schools
across the country, conducted by the social scientists at the
University of Michigan who do the Monitoring the Future surveys of
student drug use, came up with only statistically insignificant
differences between schools which subject their students to drug
testing and those that don't. Among 12th graders, for example, 37%
reported having smoked pot at schools that tested, while 36% reported
doing so at schools that didn't. Similarly, 21% reported having used
other drugs at schools that tested, while 19% reported doing so at
schools that didn't. The findings hold true with other grades as well,
the researchers reported.

The survey represents the only large or nationally representative
sample of schools that has ever been used to evaluate the
effectiveness of school drug testing.

"It suggests that there really isn't an impact from drug testing as
practiced," said lead researcher Lloyd Johnston in announcing the
study results. "We think the reason so few schools test their students
for drugs is that it is an expensive undertaking. Schools are very
pressed for funds, and I would say that the results of our
investigation raise a serious question of whether drug testing is a
wise investment of their resources. It's also very controversial with
a lot of students and parents," Johnston added.

"The way that drug testing in the schools has been carried out looks
very unpromising. I have no doubt one could design drug testing
programs that could deter teen drug use, but at what monetary cost and
what cost in terms of the intrusion into the privacy of our young
people?" Johnston asked.

Some 19% of schools nationwide had some sort of drug testing program
in place, the study found, but of those, the vast majority tested only
"on suspicion," that is, when a student was already suspected of using
drugs. Only 5% of schools test student athletes and only 4% test
students involved in extracurricular activities, the two groups
singled out by the Supreme Court for special attention. Another 4% of
schools test students who volunteer to be tested. (Many of the schools
that test athletes also test students in extracurricular activities or
who volunteer, suggesting that rigorous drug testing programs are
probably underway in less than 10% of all schools.)

The results of the study could put a damper on the use of drug testing
in the schools, according to one attorney who has played a lead role
in litigating school drug testing cases. "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," said
Graham Boyd of the American Civil Liberties Union's Drug Policy
Litigation Project, who argued the case against drug testing before
the Supreme Court last year.

While the Supreme Court, in its two rulings allowing drug testing of
student athletes (1995) and students involved in extracurricular
activities (2002), may have allowed ideology to trump science in
finding that drug testing prevents teen drug use, now the science is
available to rebut that presumption. Battles to block student drug
testing may have been lost at the high court, but this study provides
powerful ammunition to win them at the school district level.

The full study, "The relationship between student illicit drug use and
school drug-testing policies," published in the Journal of School
Health, can be found at
http://www.monitoringthefuture.org/pubs/text/ryldjpom03.pdf
online.