In class we learned that the usage of cocaine dropped
tremendously after the year of 2006, when it became legal to randomly drug test
employees. Starting in 2010, my high school started drug testing random
students once a month if they were an athlete, a member of a club or drove a
vehicle to school. I have always been curious if this infringed on the students
rights and so I thought I would research the background of drug testing
students.
So is drug
testing high school students at random an invasion of privacy? According to the
article Facts and Statistics on Random
Drug testing of High School Students, “The court upheld the constitutionality
of drug testing student athletes in 1995, and in 2002, the court expanded high
school drug testing policies to include all students who participate in a
competitive extracurricular activity. In those rulings, the court stated
deterring student drug use was more important than privacy.” So is this kind of
program worth it? The article also stated, “the majority of research suggests
that drug testing policies don’t lead to any- or only a slightly modest-
decrease in student drug use.” In my opinion, I feel it is somewhat an invasion
of privacy, but if it has any effect on lowering the drug use of high school
students it should be legal. Although this argument would be stronger if
evidence proved that drug testing in schools would cause more of a decrease in
the usage of drugs.
Sarah F M
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