This fall, students at the high school and middle schools will have extra incentive to remain well-hydrated during the school day.

Effective Oct. 1, the school corporation will begin randomly drug testing student drivers, student athletes, and student club members.

“There needed to be a rationale for [drug testing],” assistant principal

Mr. Robert McDermott said. “We obviously know that drugs are a problem in schools across the country and our school as well, and when we looked at the number of expulsions that we had for drugs, we saw it as an opportunity for the school system to get involved and help students in their plight to stay drug free.”

The school district recently signed a contract with the drug testing

company Controlled Substance Managers, Inc. On a day that the company selects, a variable number of students will be selected by their ID numbers to be removed from class and produce a urine sample. If a student is unable to produce a sample, he or she will be given 40 oz. of water and a time of three hours to induce urination. These tests will be carried out at least once a month.

Urine samples will be sent to a lab where they will be screened for a list

of ten controlled substances that includes marijuana, cocaine, and amphetamines. The student’s parents will be notified in the result of a positive test.

From there the student will undergo the recommended drug counseling and

rehabilitation. No disciplinary action will be taken against the student, and

the school corporation will withhold all test results from legal authorities.

“This isn’t a punitive program,” Superintendent Dr. Janet Emerick said.

“The goal is not to keep students out of school or keep them from playing on

their sports teams. We are simply doing what we can to get students help and assist their families.”

Although all drug tests will be paid for by the school, any aforementioned

counseling will be on the dollar of the student.

The school district is given the legal authority to administer random drug

testing among these students by virtue of a 2002 Supreme Court ruling. Schools do not, however, have the right to implement mandatory testing among an entire student body.

“We’re testing students in extracurriculars in grades seven through twelve because that is what we have the legal right to do,” Dr. Emerick said.

Among the plethora reasons teens experiment with drugs, Mr. McDermott sees peer pressure as one of the most influential and believes random drug testing will help to stem that impact.

“If a student’s at a party… and someone says, ‘Here’s some drugs,’ knowing in the back of their minds that they could be tested at school, we think that will be a deterrent for them to say no,” Mr. McDermott said.

Anabolic steroids, which are widely used among athletes on both

professional and amateur levels, will not be included in the list of drugs being tested. This decision was made despite the wide publicity of steroids and Lake Central’s own disreputable reputation of steroid use. Dr. Emerick said they were omitted for reasons of cost and that much of the decision of whether or not to screen for steroids is left to the Athletic Department.

“I think the ideal situation, finances aside, would be to test for

steroids,” Athletic Director Mr. Mark Peterson said. Peterson also claimed, “It would be wrong to say that steroid use has not been a problem in the past, but I just don’t see the physical size among athletes that would indicate widespread steroid use.”

This statement, however, is contrary to a quote of Mr. Peterson’s in the

April 22, 2005 issue of the NWI Times, in which Mr. Peterson said, “…It’s hard to think that a coach, who is a math teacher or an English teacher, would be prepared to see [the effects of steroids].”

In the article, Mr. Peterson also advocates steroid testing among student athletes.

Currently, the only school corporation employees subjected to drug testing are the bus drivers. No teachers or administrators are randomly drug tested. In order to pass a motion to test all school employees, a contract renegotiation of some kind would have to be made, according to Dr. Emerick.

When asked if she would support drug testing among teachers, Dr. Emerick said she does not believe drug use is a problem among Lake Central teachers.