Education leaders are hoping a Denver charter school that received a $150,000 grant to implement random drug tests will help the school’s at-risk students stay out of trouble and reach their full potential.
The U.S. Department of Education gave the Adolescent Counseling Exchange (ACE) Community Challenge Charter School the grant in a well-attended ceremony yesterday morning. The program will allow the school’s students to voluntarily submit their name for random drug testing. Students who fail the drug tests will be given counseling and treatment instead of receiving punitive penalties.
“This is one tool in a toolbox that the school has to reduce or eliminate drug use in the student body,” said Deborah Price, the assistant deputy secretary for the U.S. Department of Education, who attended the ceremony.
Doesn’t hurt
A high percentage of the students at the ACE Community Challenge Charter School are using drugs and need all the help they can get to stay off illegal substances, according to Price. Although she said drug testing isn’t the only measure that should be taken to help students stay off drugs, it doesn’t hurt.
“It can be effective,” she said.
Money not well spent
Several opponents of the grant said the $150,000 could be better spent in other ways.
“Chances are that the students who want to be drug tested aren’t the ones doing drugs,” said Mason Tvert, executive director for Safer Alternatives for Enjoyable Recreation. “Is this the best use of federal money?”
Tvert, who asked some heated questions at yesterday’s ceremony, pointed to studies that say randomly testing students for drugs doesn’t act as a deterrent. He also said that although he doesn’t approve of minors using marijuana, random drug tests can lead to students using alcohol and other harder drugs that are not as easily detectable by a drug test.
“It’s astonishing that they are spending this much money on a program that is so flawed and has been proven to be so ineffective,” he said.
Price disagreed that this was a waste of grant money. She referenced an ACE Community Challenge Charter School student who said “they need all the help they can get” and that random drug testing was a step in the right direction.
“Tough as the circumstances are at the school, the school’s leadership is doing a great job here,” Price exclaimed. “All in all, I think you will see good things come out of this.”
