New Richmond Exempted Village School District Supt. Adam
Bird has asked the Board of Education to consider implementing random drug
testing for New Richmond High School athletics and extracurricular
participants.
“It will give our students an additional reason to say no to
peer pressure regarding drugs and alcohol,” Bird told the Board at its April
meeting.
Random drug testing has been discussed by Bird and School
Board Policy Committee members Kim Hayden and Kristin Bennett and is on the
agenda for the next committee meeting.
Bird, at the request of Mrs. Hayden and Mrs. Bennett,
surveyed area schools for their drug testing policies and found that only
Milford currently has random drug testing among area school districts.
Milford started its program in 2006 and pulls about five
students a week from a randomly selected list of students participating in
athletics and extracurricular activities such as drama club, jazz band,
National Honor Society.
A national survey by National Center for Education
Evaluation and Regional Assistance (http://ies.ed.gov/ncee/pubs/20104025/
) found that 22 percent of high school students surveyed admitted to
experimenting with alcohol or drugs. That percentage dropped to 16 at schools
with random drug testing.
“I bring this to you, not just on a whim, not just to throw
it out there, but this is something that I am very serious about,” Bird said at
the Board’s April meeting. “I think this is very important for our schools and
our community which continues to experience heroin deaths and continues to
experience drug use and drug problems.”
Board member and former school board president Kevin
Walriven agreed.
“You have to start somewhere,” said Walriven.” We know there
is a community drug problem and you can’t sit back and do nothing.”
Under current New Richmond Exempted Village School District
Policy, participation in interscholastic athletics and extracurricular
activities is a privilege, not a right. A student athlete who has violated the
New Richmond Exempted Village School District Policy regarding drugs, alcohol,
controlled substances and tobacco will be subject to the following penalties:
denied game participation for 20% of scheduled regular season games/contests
for first offense; 50% of their sport season for a second offense if they agree
to education/intervention and treatment at the student’s expense; and denied
participating in athletics for the rest of his/her New Richmond High School
career for a third offense pending a hearing of the Superintendent and/or
designee.
The full New Richmond High School athletic handbook is
available at http://www.nrschools.org/Downloads/AthleticHandbook_2014-152.pdf.
