Stop treating students like criminals
by Ron Crickenberger


What do convicted criminals have in common with American public high school students?

Each can be forced to urinate into a paper cup at any time -- to "prove" they're drug free. Even if there's no evidence that they've ever used illegal drugs.

Now the Supreme Court will decide, in a case heard on March 19, the constitutionality of subjecting public school students to random, warrantless drug tests as a prerequisite to participating in extracurricular activities.

The case, Board of Education v. Earls, concerns an Oklahoma school district drug-testing policy. The school requires drug tests for students in grades 7-12 who want to participate in after-school events such as the chess club or the school band.

The plaintiff, Lindsay Earls, was a high school sophomore trying out for the girls choir when she was asked to urinate into a paper cup as a teacher listened outside the bathroom stall.
The experience was "humiliating," said Lindsay, who passed her test. Then she and two other students filed a lawsuit against the district because the search wasn't based on "individualized suspicion." A ruling is expected in July.

But it gets worse. If the Bush administration has its way, soon every student in the USA's 14,700 public school systems -- not just those involved in extracurricular activities -- could be subject to drug searches.

That's because the administration argued in a brief to the Supreme Court that every school should "have the flexibility to adopt reasonable measures, like the policy in this case." Note the word "reasonable." It means that schools should have the power to test any student, as long as school officials claim it is "reasonable."

But there are good reasons for Americans to stand up and "just say no" to mass drug testing of students.

It's unconstitutional. The Fourth Amendment, which prohibits unreasonable searches, clearly states that "no warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause." The Constitution contains no exception for students.

Thus, the government has no more right to compel a random urine sample from high school students than from high school principals, accountants, or even Supreme Court justices.
What part of the phrase "probable cause" don't the Bush administration's legal experts understand?...

Interestingly, in 1998 the U.S. House of Representatives quietly torpedoed a drug-testing proposal for themselves and their staffs because lawmakers protested that it was "insulting and undignified."

http://www.lp.org/press/op-eds.php?f...view&record=28
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