The American Civil Liberties Union of Ohio Foundation will file a class action lawsuit in United States District Court in Columbus on the afternoon of November 20, 2001, challenging the Dublin City School District’s policy of random drug testing of student athletes.
The Dublin School District’s policy provides for the testing of all student athletes at the beginning of their respective season, and then requires that they submit to random testing throughout the season. The District initiated the policy at the beginning of the 2000 school year. That year, out of over one thousand tests administered, only two came up positive for marijuana.
This fall produced four positives out of 1231 tests, two from the same student. “The Supreme Court has held that the validity of a school district’s random, suspicionless drug testing policy turns on whether there is a demonstrated problem. These statistics show that no such problem exists in Dublin,” said Jillian Davis, Staff Attorney for the ACLU of Ohio.
The suit, filed on behalf of all student athletes in the Dublin schools, asks the court to declare the law unconstitutional and to forbid the District from enforcing its provisions.
