|
Home » Legal » High School Civil Liberties Project » Student Drug Testing
Teacher ACLU Fact Sheet STUDENT DRUG TESTING Landmark Case - Board of Education v. Earls 536 U.S. (2002) The Constitutional Question Does random drug testing of high school athletes violate the reasonable search and seizure clause of the Fourth Amendment? Amendments Implicated 4th Amendment - The Federal Government may not violate “the right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures...” 14th Amendment - Extends this constitutional guarantee to searches and seizures by state officers. Backround School authorities in Tecumseh, Oklahoma, announced a new drug-testing policy in 1998. The policy required a urine test of all students in grades 7-12 who sign up for non-athletic extracurricular activities. Under the policy, students who refuse to take the test, or test positive more than twice, may be barred from extracurricular activities like Quiz Bowl, choir and Future Farmers of America for the rest of the school year, but do not face prosecution or expulsion. The ACLU represented Lindsey Earls, a former Tecumseh High School choir member who sued in federal court after she was made to provide a urine specimen to teachers, and who told the court that the school had no "individualized suspicion" that she was using drugs. The Decision The Supreme Court narrowly upheld school drug testing of students involved in extracurricular activities. The decision is the broadest drug testing the court has yet permitted for young people who are not under any suspicion of wrongdoing. It applies to students who join non-competitive extracurricular activities or teams, a category that includes most middle-school and high-school students. Related Case Vernonia School District v. Acton 518 U.S. (1995) The Supreme Court upheld drug testing of student athletes opining that there is a reduced expectation of privacy and students should expect intrusions on their normal rights and privileges when they choose to participate in high school athletics. The drug policy in question was upheld as constitutional under the Fourth and Fourteenth Amendments. Todd v. Rush County Schools (1998) The Seventh Circuit Court of Appeals (the federal appellate court governing Wisconsin, Illinois, and Indiana) held that students participating in non-athletic extracurricular activities may be randomly tested for drugs. Web Links |
|
