WISE BEYOND HER YEARS
USAToday has a really good Op/Ed on why randomly testing g-school students for drugs is a bad idea and a waste of money.
Now Bush wants to expand drug testing. In his recent State of the Union speech, Bush cited an 11% drop in drug use among high school students in the past two years, crediting student drug testing with a significant role in this decline. But the University of Michigan study, partially funded by the National Institute on Drug Abuse, found no difference in rates of drug use between schools that have drug-testing programs and those that do not. In fact, its authors found that 95% of schools do not test students randomly for drugs, making it unlikely that drug testing played a substantial role in the decrease Bush cited.
I’m sure that study was “junk science.” Yeah- that’s the ticket.
2 Responses to “WISE BEYOND HER YEARS”
 Comment by Laura February 2nd, 2004 at 7:15 pm |
I hate to see kids characterized as outlaws and hoodlums for no other reason than being a teenager. The schools shouldn’t be able to test them unless they have probably cause to think the kids are high or stoned. It’s my understanding that in random drug screens, a positive result actually has about a 50% chance of being a false positive. This is fixing to be a big mess. |
 Comment by Andrea February 2nd, 2004 at 7:24 pm |
The schools should not have any right to test them period. I think that right belongs to the parent, if anyone. |