MARION STUDENTS RARELY FACE DRUG TESTS

OCALA - Like more than half the country's high school students, Kumar
Vasudevan participates in extracurricular activities, where he spends time
with friends, pursues passions and gains points toward college admission.

Vasudevan is a junior at Vanguard High School and has served on the
academic team, student government and several other clubs. As a result,
he's now subject to random drug tests.

The Supreme Court on Thursday approved random drug testing for more public
high school students, ruling that schools' interest in ridding campuses of
drugs outweighs an individual's right to privacy. The 5-4 decision applies
to students who join competitive after-school activities. Previously, the
tests had been allowed only for student athletes.

"It singles out more than I would like," Vasudevan, 15, said of Thursday's
decision. He wasn't thrilled with the ruling but didn't feel it targets a
specific group since 75 percent of his peers participate in extracurricular
activities.

And Forest High School junior Shane Griffis wonders if the ruling targets
the wrong students.

"I think people that are drug-types are people that don't usually
participate in things after school," Griffis said. "I don't think they
should just target people that participate in after-school activities."

But the two do not have to worry -- at least for now. The Marion County
school system only conducts drug tests on students if there's "strong
suspicion," and the district doesn't appear eager to change that policy. "I
don't see the board expanding that policy unless we see a need that would
make it necessary, but that's my opinion," Board Member Cheryl Appelquist said.

On Thursday, the court stopped short of allowing random tests for all students.

"We find that testing students who participate in extracurricular
activities is a reasonably effective means of addressing the school
district's legitimate concerns in preventing, deterring and detecting drug
use," Justice Clarence Thomas wrote on behalf of himself, Chief Justice
William H. Rehnquist and Justices Antonin Scalia, Anthony M. Kennedy and
Stephen Breyer.

The court ruled against a former Oklahoma high school honor student who
competed on an academic quiz team and sang in the choir. Lindsay Earls, a
self-described "goodie two-shoes," tested negative but sued over what she
called a humiliating and accusatory policy.

The Pottawatomie County school system had considered testing all students,
but, instead, settled for testing only those involved in extracurricular
activities on the theory that by voluntarily representing the school, those
students had a lower expectation of privacy than did students at large.

The ruling is a follow-up to a 1995 case, in which the court allowed random
urine tests for student athletes. In that case, the court found a school
had a pervasive drug problem and athletes were among the users. Numerous
schools installed drug-testing programs for athletes after the ruling, but
wider drug testing remains relatively rare among the nation's 15,500 public
school districts.

Backers said Thursday's ruling was the next logical step, though not
everyone on the court agreed.

"The particular testing program upheld today is not reasonable; it is
capricious, even perverse," wrote Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg on behalf of
the dissenters.

Marion County Public Schools has never randomly tested athletes. Students
are only tested if there is "just cause," said district spokesman Kevin
Christian. District officials could not provide the number of students
tested for drugs this past school year.

Of the estimated 14 million American high school students, more than 50
percent likely participate in some form of organized after-school activity,
educators say. In Marion County, more than two-thirds of high school
students are involved in extracurricular activities.

Material from the Associated Press was used in this article. Steven Ray
Haberlin covers education. He can be reached at
steve.haberlin@starbanner.com or at 867-4157.