Pubdate: Thu, 21 Feb 2013 Source: Philadelphia Daily News (PA) Copyright: 2013 Philadelphia Newspapers Inc. Contact: http://www.philly.com/dailynews/about/feedback/ Website: http://www.philly.com/dailynews/ Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/339 Author: Dom Giordano Page: 19 WHY RANDOM DRUG-TESTING IS A COP-OUT, NOT AN ANSWER WHAT DO truck drivers, nuclear-powerplant operators and St. Joe's Prep students have in common? They all must submit to some form of routine, random drug-testing. Just a few days ago, the Prep joined a growing number of schools by saying that for the health and welfare of their students, the school would use a lottery system to drug-test about 180 students a year. My first reaction is to remove any discussion of constitutional rights with this policy. St. Joe's Prep is a private school, and I agree that it has every right to set a policy like this. It is the school's right to tell parents and students to comply or leave the school. This is a school with a huge waiting list and a great reputation. My second reaction is to say that this is a well-intentioned policy and probably well-thought-out and debated. My brother attended the Prep, and its reputation for academic rigor is well-deserved. However, I don't agree with this policy. I know that for some, knowing that I'm a conservative and very tough on law-and-order issues and someone who opposes legalizing marijuana, my view on this may be surprising. I find it to be very consistent with the view that I do not want to infringe on the liberty of the many because of the violations of the few. The drug-testing that the Prep will use will take a hair sample from the 180 students chosen at random each year. You might be saying, "So a lock of hair is a violation of their liberty?" It clearly is, and it smacks of a mentality that is unwilling to endorse policies that will confront those who have given some indication that they may be using illegal drugs. When I was teaching at Triton High School in South Jersey, marijuana use was an issue. I saw a great number of students who were doing well as freshmen start to slide as sophomores and drop from academic, college-bound sections to a much-less-demanding track. The Prep, in its statements, doesn't seem to admit that the school has a problem like this or any major negative event that caused it to adopt this policy. It appears that the Prep is more following a trend of top-notch private schools that are making this move. Malvern Prep in Chester County, for example, recently instituted a drug-testing policy. I wonder if the lack of this type of drug-testing makes a place like La Salle High more or less attractive to parents and students? I also wonder how parents feel about the school intervening in this most personal monitoring of their kids. Do they feel the school is doing something they'd like to do, but feel would be negative in their relationship with their child? Do they feel this technology will put their mind at ease if their kid has a negative drug test? Or do they feel, as I would, that it's my duty and right to be in touch with what my child is doing, to talk with him about marijuana and other drugs? Where do you draw the line? I think this rather sweeping policy reminds me of the tendency of many schools to institute "zero tolerance" policies. As I have said countless times on the air, zero-tolerance policies make zero sense. These types of policies remove adult judgment and common sense in dealing with kids. They often result in stories in the media of kids suspended because they brought in a plastic knife to cut a cake or made their fingers into a pretend gun. We pay schoolteachers and administrators to make sensible judgments within the context of a given situation. Zero-tolerance policies are a cop-out and create unnecessary bad publicity for school districts that look like boneheads trying to enforce and justify them. It takes a lot more judgment and vigilance to talk with parents and their kids if there are signs of problems with drugs rather than making everyone a suspect in a lottery. In fairness to St. Joe's, I do buy into the notion that the drug-testing policy may give kids who are under the threat of a drug test a good excuse to avoid peer pressure and "just say no." This might allow a student a good way to say, "I want to but I can't risk getting caught." I also commend St. Joe's for not limiting the drug-testing to kids who play sports, are on the debate team or participate in the school play. I've never understood why schools would want to put an added burden on those kids who are probably among the better students. However, even acknowledging these benefits and the good intentions of school officials, this is still a flawed idea. It might be an area in which conservatives and liberals can come together to oppose it. The lesson Prep students will get is that "you are all suspect, and since we have some pretty technology, we'll act on that suspicion." - --- MAP posted-by: Matt