ADF Position on Drug Testing in Schools

Summary

• To minimise harm, school communities must support students 'at risk' of drug use problems to remain within the school system.
• Many schools are already dealing effectively with drug use by providing counselling to students, resourcing parents, providing special programs for vulnerable students and involving police where appropriate.
• Drug testing of students has been proposed as a possible solution.
• The Australian Drug Foundation does not believe that drug testing is the answer to managing drugs in schools and urges caution for those schools considering adopting drug testing.
• There are too many unresolved legal, ethical and technical issues surrounding drug testing in schools to be able say what role school drug testing programs could fulfill. The ADF wishes to see a properly conducted evaluation of a school drug testing program.

The Question:

Does the use of drug testing in schools help minimise drug-related harm to students?

Background

With over 50 per cent of Year 12 students experimenting with cannabis (1), and more schools having to deal with drug using students (2), illicit drug use by school students is a growing concern. Some schools are responding to this by introducing or, considering the introduction of, drug testing of students.

Advocates of drug testing claim it will provide proof where drug-use is suspected; deter students from using drugs; assist former users to remain drug-free, and reassure parents that the school is doing everything it can to prevent drug use. In conjunction with disciplinary and welfare sanctions, monitoring individual students on a random basis may provide schools with an alternative to expulsion, allowing them to give students "a second chance". This appears to conform to the 1996 Premier's Drug Advisory Council’s recommendation that it is important for "...schools (to) support students at risk of developing drug problems by helping them to remain at school (3).

Drug testing, however, raises a number of complex social, ethical, legal and technical issues that are not resolved.

Procedure: Drug testing or screening requires a bodily sample (breath, urine, blood, saliva or hair) to be analysed for the presence of a specified drug. Urine analysis is the preferred method of drug testing and collection of samples must be closely monitored to ensure compliance. Laboratories should meet Australian Standards, involving considerable cost to whoever is required to pay for the service.

Reliability: false negative and false positive results can, and do, occur. If drug testing is used as a rationale to expel students, a false positive test may have the direst consequences for a student innocent of drug use.

Substitution: students may switch to more exotic drugs that they believe are less likely to be tested for, or identified, or use other chemicals as masking agents to evade detection, exposing students to greater harm due to the unpredictable effects of the substituted drugs.

Interpretation: results will only show if a student has used a drug recently. It will not tell if the drug was used once as an experiment or more regularly, or if the drug was used at school or outside of the school’s jurisdiction.

Rights of the individual: opponents argue that drug testing is intrusive and infringes on the individual’s rights to privacy. It demonstrates a lack of trust between school staff and students, which reinforces suspicion and can create victimisation and alienation. This is counter productive to establishing a school environment with the kind of open communication needed to adequately understand and support students.

Impact on the student: consideration of how the test results are used and the resulting impact on the student’s reputation and schooling future is crucial to this debate. Leaving school prematurely reduces a young person’s future life opportunities and intensifies the risk of problematic behaviours, including excessive drug use.

Some commonly asked questions and responses
Is drug testing necessary?

Is drug testing reliable?

Why can test results be unreliable?

Why just test for illicit drugs?

Conclusion

It is clear that drug testing school students evokes many social, ethical and legal arguments that remain to be resolved. It is important to consider if the potential gains of drug testing are sufficient to outweigh the costs. There is no evidence as yet that testing provides better outcomes than methods currently employed by schools to respond to drug use. It is a matter that schools should approach with caution. Where schools do adopt this strategy, they should be prepared to trial the process and continue only if evaluation indicates positive outcomes.

References

1. Letcher T, White V. ‘Australian secondary students' use of over-the-counter and illicit substances in 1996,’ Anti-Cancer Council of Victoria, 1999.
2. Australian Drug Foundation, ‘Retaining students at school by responding to cannabis use in schools, CONNECT Project Final Report, 2000.
3. Joint Departmental Information Centre, Drugs and Our Community: Report of the Premier’s Drug Advisory Council, Melbourne, 1996.
4. MacDonald S et al 'The limitations of drug screening in the workplace,' International Labour Review 132, 1, 1993, 95-113