STUDY QUESTIONS SCHOOL DRUG TESTS

No deterrence is found in survey of 76,000 U.S. students

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

The U.S. Supreme Court has twice empowered schools to test for drugs first
among student athletes in 1995, then last year for those in other
extracurricular activities. 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 government-financed study of 76,000 students nationwide, by far
the largest to date, found that drug use was 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," said Lloyd Johnston, a researcher from the University of
Michigan, who worked on the study. "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 adolescent drug use is considered highly reliable.

The study found, for example, 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 basic pattern held true for all drugs and grade levels the study
explored. 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 curbing their drug
consumption.

Graham Boyd, a lawyer for the American Civil Liberties Union, who argued the
case against drug testing before the Supreme Court last year, said,
"Obviously, the justices did not have the benefit of this study. 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 only prove 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 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
testing could reduce drug use.

The Michigan study, published last month in The Journal of School Health,
found that only 18 percent of American schools did any kind of screening
from 1998 to 2001, most of them high schools.

Such tests do not violate the Fourth Amendment safeguards against
unreasonable searches and seizures, the Supreme Court has ruled, because
children have limited expectations of privacy, the tests are not overly
intrusive and because they are likely to deter substance abuse.

The study would not have swayed Randall Aultman, former principal of
Vernonia High School in Oregon, whose decision to screen student athletes
led to the Supreme Court's ruling in 1995. Drug use was so rampant among his
students that he says "we had to do something drastic," without even knowing
whether it was legal, much less effective.

"I don't think that drug testing works all the time, in all situations,"

Aultman said. "And the truth is, there were many kids who said, 'Yeah, we
quit while we were in season and once the season was over we went back to
using drugs."'

Even so, Aultman added, other students quit for life, and "at that time, it
really worked."

The Michigan study collected data on the testing policies at 722 middle and
high schools, and drew on anonymous surveys from 30,000 eighth graders,
23,000 10th graders and 23,000 12th graders, an enormous statistical
undertaking that may not be matched for years to come.

There is at least one important limitation of the Michigan study.

It does not differentiate between schools that do intensive, regular
screening and those that test only occasionally. As a result, it does not
rule out the possibility that the most vigilant schools do a better job of
fighting drug use.