Posted on by Californiacontrarian

Who Really Wants To Know ?

In our local paper, there was a recent article from the N.Y. Times about an Ohio school that was planning to drug test its students. The article was on both “the who, the what, and the when” of this drug testing program, but also on the legality of such testing. Since this school, Stephen T Baden High School, was a Catholic school, David Bloomfield, a law professor, said, “The school seems largely within its rights to come up with this policy.” I am going to assume that the parents of these Hamilton, Ohio high school students would like to know if their son/daughter are vaping or using drugs or alcohol. If for some reason they do not want their son/daughter tested, then they can just pull the child out of that school, and then they will not know.

In 2002 the U.S. Supreme Court had already ruled 5-4  that public schools could randomly test its students. My question is, “If random drug testing of students is legal, why is it not done more frequently? Why is it not done in every middle school and high school in this state?” I suppose that the standard retort to ubiquitous random drug testing of students would have something to do with  . . . infringing on one’s privacy, unreasonable search, etc. If I am a concerned parent, would I want my child randomly tested for drugs? It’s hard to imagine a concerned parent who would not want to know if a son/daughter were using drugs, although in one local private school apparently some of the parents were concerned that a positive drug test would somehow find its way to a college application. To me this is perplexing . . . “better that my son/daughter get into a good college; if he/she is on drugs, so be it!” Huh?? I am not sure that I can refer to these parents as “concerned.” Of  course, there will always be parents who don’t really give a toot, but I would not put them in the “concerned parent” group. If my child is using drugs, I want to know.

I suppose that the other argument against random drug testing of all students is cost. Certainly these tests cannot be done for free. Someone would have to pay. To me I would view this random testing as similar to an insurance policy, and the best insurance policy is one that you never use. If my child or grandchild is sporadically tested, and is consistently negative . . . wonderful, and I will gladly chip in to pay for this testing. Again, if my child is using drugs, I want to know.

From the perspective of the state would it be beneficial to know which and how many students were using drugs? In the short run, this information would be hard to accept for some, and possibly be of little value to a fair number of parents. However, in the long run if only a small number of students are identified and consequently are able to get off the drugs, the benefit to the state would be well worth the price of the testing. Over the long run there would be less crime as these individuals would not be forced to get money for repeated fixes. Instead of having more drug addicts siphoning from the system, the state would have more individuals contributing to the system. The apropos question is: “Does the state really want to know?”

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