HEADLINE: STUDENTS HAVE A
RIGHT TO PROTECTION
BYLINE: Miller Newton
PUBLISHED: August 13,
1985", Tuesday; Page A-19 (ill.) (15 in.)
SECTION: OPINION
TYPE: OP-ED
NOTES: Dr. Miller Newton is
president and clinical director of KIDS of Bergen County, a
private, nonprofit organization based in River
Edge that helps young people with drug and
alcohol problems.
TEXT:
The
decision by the Becton Regional High School trustees to require students to take
a drug and alcohol test is a strong stand on behalf of a drug-free environment
in school. The action has stirred up a major controversy among teachers, school
officials, and civil libertarians. The latter group sees the decision as a
violation of students' rights. But I think that the issue in this case is: What
kind of rights are we defending for students?
The school board's position
is to defend the kids' rights to a safe, non-threatening environment for the
purposes of another fundamental right of the young in America, a
public education.
Our legal system embodies a
number of protective rights for those
beneath the age of majority. We protect them from abuse by adults, including
their own parents. With child-labor laws we protect them from abuse in the work
setting. We protect them from financial responsibility,
meaning debt and
civil-court liability, because they're not yet prepared to handle decisions in
those areas.
Given the basic principle
that society has an obligation to protect minors from physical and psychological
danger, the decision by Becton officials embodies protection for the basic right
of growing up safely. But urine screening, which
the board has ordered, is not a panacea. Those of us who have worked in the
field know that a lot of teen-agers and young adults successfully pass the urine
screen even though they're
regular drug users.
Given the difficulty of
urine sampling as a technique for providing a
safe and drug-free environment, I suggest that not all students be
tested but only those who
show evidence of a problem. This would require training of all school personnel
-- not only counselors, teachers, and administrators but also cafeteria,
maintenance, and bus personnel -- to recognize the simple symptoms of
intoxication by alcohol, marijuana, or other substances. Where there is evidence
of possible intoxication, that individual would be required to have a urine
screen immediately.
The same principles should
apply here that apply to the Breathalyzer test in driving. The student would
have the right to refuse the test, but that would mean automatic suspension from
school -- just as there is automatic suspension of the driver's license for a
motorist who refuses to take the Breathalyzer test.
Young people have a right
to education as long as they're capable of taking advantage of that education.
Not only is learning impossible for an intoxicated student, he interferes with
others' rights to education in safety.
From my work with
teen-agers who have drug problems, I know how heartbreaking it is to watch the
struggle of young people who've struggled to become drug free, to see them go
back to school and be exposed to the aroma of marijuana and to the pressure of
their peers, and to watch them regress. I believe that kids who have a drug
problem and have undergone treatment with the support of their families have the
right to be protected from exposure to drugs in a publicly run institution.
After all, drug use is a violation of city, state, and federal laws.
Teen-agers haven't
developed mature decision-making processes, which is one of the major tasks of
the adolescent developmental period. There's no way that
they can make a good choice about drugs.
They're particularly
vulnerable, physically and psychologically, to the
drug high, because they lack the qualities in the psyche that resist addiction.
Consequently the idea that kids ought to make free choices flies in the face of
our knowledge about adolescence and our legal concept of protecting underage
people from dangerous situations beyond their ability to cope.
<END>
CAPTIONS: Staff
illustration by Rodrick Eyer
TERMS: STUDENT. RIGHT.
DRUG. ALCOHOL. TEST. EDUCATION. SCHOOL. YOUTH
ORDER NUMBER:
974010
NOTICE: Copyright 1985 Bergen Record Corp.