THE SYMBOLISM OF MANDATORY TESTING TEENS IN SCHOOL

I was raised in a factory town in central Iowa. Growing up, I was
fairly bright, always top in my classes. But I was also a very shy,
lonely, unsocialized nerd who got teased and bullied almost daily. I
joined the choir because through it I could be with other kids like
me. The bullies didn't do choir, or orchestra, so it was great. I even
did well, so I stuck with it. Participating in choir helped build my
self-esteem, gave me self-confidence. Eventually I got into debate,
even drama. Extracurricular activities helped me a lot.

I would never have done any of that if I'd been forced to prove that I
was 'clean' by giving a urine sample. No, I wasn't a little pot-head,
I would have tested clean as a whistle. The humiliation of being made
to urinate on command, in front of a teacher witness, when I hadn't
even done anything, would have been enough to keep me from ever trying
out.

That's why I oppose the urine testing of kids who want to sing in
choir, or participate in debate. Oh, sure, the cost is one factor --
at $10 to $20 a pop, the tests sound cheap. Until you do the math. For
example, one year my high school choir had 90 voices. A test at the
beginning of the year for everyone, like the Tecumseh, Oklahoma system
program calls for, is 90, plus random testing of some kids throughout
the year, say just 10% each month (9x9 or 81), for a total of 171
tests, at a cost of between $1710 and $3420 a year. That's only for
the choir. Our program was always underfunded, there wasn't an extra
$3420 lying around, so choir would have had to make budget cuts.

Since it wouldn't have caught anyone, proponents would have claimed
that testing was 'successful.' Thing is, there were almost no drug
users in choir, or band, and the ones that did use anything mostly
used alcohol. (Alcohol leaves the system hours after use, so a kid
would have to show up drunk to get busted by a urine test.) Claims of
success would have been absolutely false.

Let's run through this once again: The kids who would be targeted
under this Court-approved scheme are the shy, quiet intellectual types
who want to participate in music, debate, and other non-athletic
activities -- the very kids who are least likely to be drug users.

These kids, some of whom are participating in choir or band to build
their self-confidence, would be made to humiliate themselves by
urinating in front of a teacher witness. (And by the way, who will you
be allowing to watch your child go to the bathroom?) Some of them
wouldn't do it. The rest would have to live with repressed anger and
resentment, something which in these post-Columbine days one would
think we don't want to encourage.

Urine testing programs cost thousands of dollars a year, even for a
mid-sized school district. One program, in Dublin, OH, was abandoned
after spending thousand of dollars and catching only 10 kids. For the
money, the school system could have hired a counselor. They could also
have funded any of dozens of effective, proven prevention programs,
such as those recommended by the federal Center for Substance Abuse
Prevention. (None of which involve urine testing.) There is a great
deal of research on what works. In contrast, the National Research
Council noted a year ago regarding school drug testing programs that
"There is no scientific evidence regarding the effects of these
programs, either on drug use or on the learning environment."

We're told that urine testing of innocent kids is an important symbol.
But a symbol of what? Certainly not of American values and common
sense. No, these programs are symbols of the utter failure of not just
the drug war, but also the imaginations of those who run it. They
can't stop people from doing illegal drugs, so they will instead
punish everyone, especially the innocent, for their failure.