Schools Compare Local Drug Wars as U.S. Threatens to Cut Aid to Permissive Districts

South Carolina school principal Ben Nesbit said he became suspicious when two students who had been suspended for using drugs later passed urine tests.

“We found out a couple of weeks ago that there’s a chemical that washes drugs out of the system,” said Nesbit, of Spring Valley High School in Columbia, S.C.

“The students use it full time, washing out their systems and being tested, all the time being high.”

The street name of the purging agent is Golden Seal, said District of Columbia teacher Leroy Lewis Jr., explaining that it also is popular with students in the capital.

This is proof that the campaign against drugs in schools is serious and must be waged in a no-nonsense but flexible manner, Lewis said.

“Kids recognize all the problems of the system,” said Lewis, who teaches government at Spingarn Senior High. “They know how to circumvent us better than we know how to plan.”

The effort to keep youngsters away from drugs has evolved from Nancy Reagan’s mere “Just Say No” slogan to a Bush Administration threat to end federal aid to schools, colleges and universities that fail to prove they have strict policies.

The tougher approach reflects a growing concern. Statistics indicate that 5% of high school seniors drink alcohol daily and more than 60,000 adolescents ages 12 or 13 have tried cocaine.

“Young people show a faster propensity to develop an addiction, and the damage by addiction can be more permanent,” said Doug Hall of the National Parents’ Resource Institute for Drug Education.

The federal government is expected to spend about $500 million disseminating anti-drug information in this fiscal year, about $180 million more than the year that ended Sept. 30. In 1986, only $3 million was allocated for drug education.

Almost all high schools and 87% of elementary schools offer some sort of anti-drug lectures. The new federal strategy says that school-based prevention programs should be backed up with tough policies on use, possession and distribution of drugs.

Success Hard to Measure

Schools are trying a variety of approaches, with no clear trend emerging. Success is hard to measure, since so many of the approaches are new.

In Texas, football players’ urine is tested. Illinois and Delaware laws allow spot searches of students, and Delaware plans to take drug-sniffing dogs into schools.

In Jefferson County, Ky., schools notify police of every drug incident, suspend students for six to 10 days for possession or use, and transfer repeat offenders. The Pittsburgh Board of Education has decided that any student convicted of trafficking in or possessing drugs, on or off school property, will be subject to expulsion.

“Drug Free Zone” near public and private schools in Prince Georges’ County, Md., warn that anyone convicted of possessing or distributing drugs within 1,000 feet of a schoolyard could face up to 40 years in prison.

Education officials estimate that perhaps 25 states have some sort of similar programs or laws.

“We see more expulsions and suspensions for use because it’s against the law,” said James Better, staff director of the Education Department’s Drug-Free Schools Recognition Program, “but most schools have referral and re-entry programs.”

At the local level, Education Department officials estimate that 73% of America’s 16,490 school districts have written drug policies. Of these, more than 90% involve notifying parents and/or police, and suspension or counseling.

Most major education groups avoid advocating specific policies for schools. At most they offer general guidelines, like those jointly developed by the American Assn. of School Administrators, the National Assn. of School Nurses and the National Education Assn.

“We have problems when the feds try to impose decisions on the locals, so national groups avoid doing the same thing,” said Lew Armistead of the National Assn. of Secondary School Principals.

Hall, vice president of the National Parents’ Resource Institute for Drug Education (PRIDE) in Atlanta, said: “We don’t believe in dealing with these people as criminals. You really can’t incarcerate your way out of a drug problem.”

Hall pointed to statistics that say “school buildings or campuses are one of the least popular places” for students to use or distribute drugs. Also, he said, students tend to use drugs at night and on weekends, not at school.

“PRIDE supports treatment on demand,” said Hall, “but the problem is, it’s difficult to draw the line on whether the school is responsible or the parents.”

Nesbit insisted: “It is a school problem, because (students) can’t learn when they are stoned. They can’t learn when they’re dead. They can’t learn when they’re in the hospital. We’re going to be paying for their rehabilitation forever and ever, because so many people are hooked.”

Nesbit said that he makes use of grass-roots approaches such as “sending out letters of complaints to local liquor stores that sell alcohol to minors” or encouraging suspension of users and automatic expulsion of sellers.

In addition to the District of Columbia’s policies, Lewis offers early-morning tutoring to students who want help with schoolwork and “to talk about what’s going on with them, with somebody they want to trust.”

Jenlane Gee, a teacher from Modesto, Calif., complained that the government’s efforts have ignored elementary schools.

Gee, who teaches third grade at Christine Sipherd School, said that equal emphasis should be placed on younger pupils because studies show that children usually decide between the third and fifth grades whether they will try alcohol or other drugs.

Nesbit added that simply talking --or acting--tough won’t stop drug use.

“I think there’s a hard line” emerging in the schools, he said, “but there’s no comprehensive policy that helps kids to make good decisions about their future, their bodies and their values.”