Trion saves with cups over swabs for student drug screens

Trion City Schools is swapping swabs for cups in a drug-screening move that should save almost $10 per test and improve accuracy, officials said.

"The main reason we're changing procedures is it's financially advantageous," Trion Superintendent Phil Williams said.

He said neighboring systems and several systems in Trion's athletic region use urinalysis to drug-test students.

"With our other drug testing procedure, we were doing 10 randomly selected students a quarter," Mr. Williams said. "Now, we're doing 15 with this new urinalysis test, and we're also going to incorporate all of our athletic teams and extracurricular activity groups."

Testing is a strong deterrent, he said.

"We feel this will give students a chance to say 'No' to drugs," he said. "Rather than cite their parents as prudes, students can say, 'I don't want to take a chance of getting kicked off the football, the baseball team or get kicked out of band.'"

Trion parents were sent a notification letter Jan. 13, and an explanatory notice is posted on the school Web site at www.trionschools.org.

Trion City is among several regional systems that drug-test students to some degree, records show. Like Trion, Walker County tests students who drive to school, officials said.

Whitfield County Schools stand alone among Northwest Georgia systems in swab testing. Officials said there were no immediate plans to change.

While the U.S. Supreme Court has ruled against drug tests for teachers, a 2002 ruling upheld a local policy requiring drug tests and later random drug tests of students who participate in extracurricular activities, according to documents on the Georgia School Boards Association's "eLaw" Web site.

State Department of Education spokesman Matt Cardoza said a 2007-08 Safe and Drug-Free Schools report shows 31 school systems in Georgia using student drug testing.

Jan Tanner, Mr. Williams' administrative assistant and the person who coordinates testing in Trion schools, said the new procedure is better all the way around.

"It's much better and much, much more economical," Ms. Tanner said.

The old swab tests cost $26 or $27 each and had other fees attached, she said. The new urinalysis rate is a flat $17 per test, she said.

"And the vendor (Safety & Compliance Management Inc. in Rock Spring, Ga.) contacts the parents if there's a positive," she said.

There have been no recent positive tests, she noted.

Safety and Compliance owner Calvin Andrews said urinalysis is most often used by the aviation industry, the federal government and other entities because of accuracy.

"Urinalysis is the gold standard of drug testing," Mr. Andrews said.

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