RogueTrader
06-27-2002, 07:55 PM
I have jumped into this one with both feet over at Synergy.....
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I must admit that I too am apalled....Of course, the ruling does not specify what an appropriate extra curricular activity is. Would you be able to extend it to riding on school busses?
If students choose to dissent they may not participate in extra curricular activities which would otherwise impede their chances of getitng into a good college and thus impede them achieving their full potential.
The message is clear....If you have nothing to hide why not submit? Our judgement sux so we have to test your urine....you might be thinking the wrong things....
Ex smokers are always the most unreasonable and irrational when it comes to enforcing anti-smoking laws, and ex-drug addicts like President Bush are always the most rabid when it comes to enforcing things like this.....all you can hope for is a couple of deaths on the supreme court in about 6 years....
M
The link
U.S. High Court Upholds School Drug Tests
Thu Jun 27, 2:22 PM ET
By James Vicini
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - A divided U.S. Supreme Court ( news - web sites) ruled on Thursday that public middle and high schools can require drug tests for students in extracurricular activities like choir or band without violating their privacy rights.
By a 5-4 vote, the high court said the program in Tecumseh, Oklahoma, that required students who want to take part in after-school activities to submit to random urinalysis was a "reasonable means" to prevent and detect drug use.
The tests, required without any suspicion of drug use, covered students in grades 7 to 12 who sign up for such activities as cheerleading, choir, band, the academic team, the Future Farmers of America and Future Homemakers of America.
Critics said the ruling opened the door for drug testing of the 23 million students in public high schools across the country.
The four dissenters said students who take part in extracurricular activities were far less likely to have drug problems than their less-involved peers.
In dissent, Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg ( news - web sites) ridiculed the "nightmarish images of out-of-control flatware, livestock run amok and colliding tubas disturbing the peace and quiet in Tecumseh."
She said most students the school wanted to test were not even involved in "safety-sensitive" activities.
On the last day of their term, the court majority ruled the drug-testing policy did not violate constitutional privacy protections against unreasonable searches.
"The nationwide drug epidemic makes the war against drugs a pressing concern in every school," Justice Clarence Thomas ( news - web sites) said for the majority. "We conclude that the invasion of students' privacy is not significant."
A student who refuses to take the test or who tests positive more than twice cannot take part in competition for the rest of the school year. Students are tested at the start of the school year and then randomly throughout the year, with names drawn every month.
RULING COULD BOOST SCHOOL DRUG TESTS
The ruling could boost school drug testing. Over the past three years, about 5 percent of schools nationwide have required drug tests for student athletes while about 2 percent have tested students in other extracurricular activities.
The Supreme Court last addressed the issue in 1995, when it ruled that public high schools and middle schools may force student athletes to submit to drug tests. The Oklahoma case covered extracurricular activities other than athletics.
Thomas rejected the argument that the students involved in nonathletic extracurricular activities have a greater expectation of privacy because they were not subject to regular physicals and communal undress.
"Some of these clubs and activities require occasional off-campus travel and communal undress," he said.
Thomas described as minimally intrusive the way the urine sample was collected.
"A faculty monitor waits outside the closed restroom stall for the student to produce a sample and must 'listen for the normal sounds of urination in order to guard against tampered specimens'," Thomas said.
In Tecumseh, a rural town about 40 miles (64 km) from Oklahoma City, two students challenged the policy after its adoption in 1998, claiming the school failed to show it had a problem with illegal drugs.
Of the more than 500 students tested while the program was in effect during part of two school years, only three students, all athletes, tested positive. Two of the athletes also participated in other extracurricular activities.
In addition to Ginsburg, Justices John Paul Stevens ( news - web sites), Sandra Day O'Connor ( news - web sites) and David Souter ( news - web sites) dissented.
The Drug Policy Alliance, a drug policy organization, criticized the ruling.
"The court's decision is both foolhardy and dangerous in sending exactly the wrong message to America's children -- that they have no right to privacy, and that schools can prioritize the cleanliness of one's urine over academic achievement and participation in student life," Judy Appel, the group's deputy legal director, said.
Joseph Califano of the National Center on Addiction and Substance Abuse at Columbia University in New York, applauded the decision, but said drug testing alone won't solve the problem.
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Howard Roark laughed......
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I must admit that I too am apalled....Of course, the ruling does not specify what an appropriate extra curricular activity is. Would you be able to extend it to riding on school busses?
If students choose to dissent they may not participate in extra curricular activities which would otherwise impede their chances of getitng into a good college and thus impede them achieving their full potential.
The message is clear....If you have nothing to hide why not submit? Our judgement sux so we have to test your urine....you might be thinking the wrong things....
Ex smokers are always the most unreasonable and irrational when it comes to enforcing anti-smoking laws, and ex-drug addicts like President Bush are always the most rabid when it comes to enforcing things like this.....all you can hope for is a couple of deaths on the supreme court in about 6 years....
M
The link
U.S. High Court Upholds School Drug Tests
Thu Jun 27, 2:22 PM ET
By James Vicini
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - A divided U.S. Supreme Court ( news - web sites) ruled on Thursday that public middle and high schools can require drug tests for students in extracurricular activities like choir or band without violating their privacy rights.
By a 5-4 vote, the high court said the program in Tecumseh, Oklahoma, that required students who want to take part in after-school activities to submit to random urinalysis was a "reasonable means" to prevent and detect drug use.
The tests, required without any suspicion of drug use, covered students in grades 7 to 12 who sign up for such activities as cheerleading, choir, band, the academic team, the Future Farmers of America and Future Homemakers of America.
Critics said the ruling opened the door for drug testing of the 23 million students in public high schools across the country.
The four dissenters said students who take part in extracurricular activities were far less likely to have drug problems than their less-involved peers.
In dissent, Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg ( news - web sites) ridiculed the "nightmarish images of out-of-control flatware, livestock run amok and colliding tubas disturbing the peace and quiet in Tecumseh."
She said most students the school wanted to test were not even involved in "safety-sensitive" activities.
On the last day of their term, the court majority ruled the drug-testing policy did not violate constitutional privacy protections against unreasonable searches.
"The nationwide drug epidemic makes the war against drugs a pressing concern in every school," Justice Clarence Thomas ( news - web sites) said for the majority. "We conclude that the invasion of students' privacy is not significant."
A student who refuses to take the test or who tests positive more than twice cannot take part in competition for the rest of the school year. Students are tested at the start of the school year and then randomly throughout the year, with names drawn every month.
RULING COULD BOOST SCHOOL DRUG TESTS
The ruling could boost school drug testing. Over the past three years, about 5 percent of schools nationwide have required drug tests for student athletes while about 2 percent have tested students in other extracurricular activities.
The Supreme Court last addressed the issue in 1995, when it ruled that public high schools and middle schools may force student athletes to submit to drug tests. The Oklahoma case covered extracurricular activities other than athletics.
Thomas rejected the argument that the students involved in nonathletic extracurricular activities have a greater expectation of privacy because they were not subject to regular physicals and communal undress.
"Some of these clubs and activities require occasional off-campus travel and communal undress," he said.
Thomas described as minimally intrusive the way the urine sample was collected.
"A faculty monitor waits outside the closed restroom stall for the student to produce a sample and must 'listen for the normal sounds of urination in order to guard against tampered specimens'," Thomas said.
In Tecumseh, a rural town about 40 miles (64 km) from Oklahoma City, two students challenged the policy after its adoption in 1998, claiming the school failed to show it had a problem with illegal drugs.
Of the more than 500 students tested while the program was in effect during part of two school years, only three students, all athletes, tested positive. Two of the athletes also participated in other extracurricular activities.
In addition to Ginsburg, Justices John Paul Stevens ( news - web sites), Sandra Day O'Connor ( news - web sites) and David Souter ( news - web sites) dissented.
The Drug Policy Alliance, a drug policy organization, criticized the ruling.
"The court's decision is both foolhardy and dangerous in sending exactly the wrong message to America's children -- that they have no right to privacy, and that schools can prioritize the cleanliness of one's urine over academic achievement and participation in student life," Judy Appel, the group's deputy legal director, said.
Joseph Califano of the National Center on Addiction and Substance Abuse at Columbia University in New York, applauded the decision, but said drug testing alone won't solve the problem.
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Howard Roark laughed......