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Mandated drug testing is a waste of time

by Published: Nov 2, 2011

Current and incom­ing stu­dents at Ferris deserve to have the right to a pri­vate life that is not intruded on by our university.

With man­dated drug test­ing, the uni­ver­sity would be doing just that. Last week, an arti­cle in the Torch was pub­lished con­cern­ing man­dated drug tests. Don’t worry; you don’t have to start chug­ging gal­lons of water to flush your sys­tem. There won’t be any drug testing.

Last week’s costly and pre­pos­ter­ous idea of required drug test­ing for admis­sion to Ferris will only dis­cour­age stu­dents inter­ested in join­ing our uni­ver­sity. And not only will it dis­cour­age stu­dents, but will also com­pletely abol­ish their civil rights. Every stu­dent should not sud­denly be lumped into a group of sus­pected crim­i­nals, espe­cially with­out any prior evidence.

Yes, we’re prepar­ing for the work­force and some­times we’ll have to pee in cups to become employed, but we come to col­lege to learn from our expe­ri­ences so we know how to pre­pare for our future careers. Not every­thing we learn is taught in a classroom.

What a per­son does in his free time is solely up to that per­son. There is no rea­son Ferris should keep peo­ple, who may want to bet­ter them­selves through edu­ca­tion, from pay­ing for that jus­tice sim­ply because of their choices. Doing so would be discrimination.

Drug test­ing indi­vid­ual stu­dents who apply to this uni­ver­sity will cost the uni­ver­sity more time and money than it will save them. Even if this were applied, cur­rent and future stu­dents would know they need to take a drug test and those who are wor­ried would pre­pare accord­ingly. Repeated drug test­ing would just cost the uni­ver­sity more money and be a big waste of time.

If the uni­ver­sity puts the cost of the drug test on the stu­dent and you’re a stu­dent who knows you are not in vio­la­tion of the test then why would you will­ingly pay for, let’s say, a $50 drug test every semester?

I wouldn’t. If I had to shell out more money on top of my tuition each semes­ter for a worth­less drug test, I would trans­fer to another school that did not waste my money or my time.

If Ferris did have the audac­ity to waste stu­dents’ time by test­ing for drugs, then they should also test for one of the most com­monly used drugs on cam­pus: alcohol.

Alcohol causes more deaths on col­lege cam­puses than sev­eral com­mon illicit drugs, accord­ing to a study by the National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism Task Force on col­lege drinking.

Alcohol has also been proven to be more lethal than many ille­gal drugs, accord­ing to Robert Gable, in his 2006 essay “The Toxicity of Recreational Drugs.”

Surely this cam­pus has wit­nessed cel­e­bra­tions for St. Patrick’s Day and Ferris Fest, where pub­lic ine­bri­a­tion is ram­pant. Drinking alco­hol is just as unpro­duc­tive as any other recre­ational drug. Spending a week­end binge boozin’ is as big a waste of time for the stu­dents and pro­fes­sors as any other sub­stance in question.

There should be no dis­crim­i­na­tion based solely on drugs sim­ply because they are not legal. If a recre­ational sub­stance is going to be judged, then all of them should be and that should be done fairly.

No mat­ter the sub­stance abused, bal­ance the choice to take that with your future. Whichever one is more impor­tant to you is your deci­sion. Any sub­stance can tar­nish your future in some way if you allow it to.

We came to col­lege for one thing: a degree that will lead to a career. Don’t let dis­trac­tions change your main focus. n

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  • Anon

    If your “pri­vate life” involves ille­gal passtimes, I think a col­lege has every right to know. It’s not dis­crim­i­na­tion — it’s keep­ing tabs on crim­i­nal activ­ity. It’s no dif­fer­ent than a police offi­cer hav­ing a speed gun aimed at every car that passes. Not every­one speeds, but when some­one rushes by at 100+mph, the police offi­cer knows exactly what he or she is fac­ing and is able to act, pos­si­bly pre­vent­ing seri­ous injury to the speeder and other dri­vers on the road. Drug test­ing every incom­ing stu­dent is no dif­fer­ent. Yes, alco­hol causes more deaths and prob­lems than per­haps all ille­gal sub­stances com­bined, but if we can elim­i­nate the small per­cent­age of issues brought about by those that are ille­gal, it is still a dif­fer­ence being made — just like the offi­cer real­izes that he or she can’t pull over every per­son going 10mph over the speed limit, at least he or she can take the most dan­ger­ous dri­vers off the road.

    • Fhfdghdfghsdfg

      Yes, let’s ignore the prob­lems that are directly in front of our face and instead spend all of our time and money on a small per­cent­age of peo­ple, whose only crime is use. It’s ridicu­lous that the author of the orig­i­nal arti­cle wrote that col­lege admis­sion should be based on drug tests, mean­while in a pre­vi­ous arti­cle states that stu­dents shouldn’t get MIPs for walk­ing around town drunk.And again, this doesn’t address the issue of the cost or the fact that a per­son will pre­pare for the test.This holier-than-thou atti­tude, “we’re doing it to pro­tect you” is com­plete nonsense.“If your ‘pri­vate life’ involves ille­gal passtimes [sic], I think a col­lege has every right to know”. I am will­ing to bet money you have down­loaded music illegally. I’m also will­ing to bet money you have exceeded the speed limit. Should Ferris mon­i­tor your com­puter and deny your admit­tance for down­load­ing a song off a sketchy web­site?  Should Ferris install black boxes in your car and deny admit­tance because you speed?Interestingly enough, a typ­i­cal piracy law­suit will cost more and more neg­a­tively affect a col­lege student’s life than a sim­ple pos­ses­sion charge. Speeding puts more peo­ple at risk than per­sonal drug use. Obviously this selec­tive enforce­ment pol­icy isn’t for the student’s own well-being.There is one thing that should mat­ter: class per­for­mance. If a stu­dent uses ille­gal drugs and has a 4.0, who is to say they can’t go here because they tested pos­i­tive? Again, what does that prove? If a stu­dent is fail­ing because they are going to class high, kick them out of school. If a per­son is on drugs in pub­lic or on the job, arrest or fire them. But for the sim­ple act of use, denial of admit­tance to school is more harm­ful than some­thing like mar­i­juana use itself.

      To the author of this arti­cle: It’s com­pletely appar­ent that you stole every sin­gle point of this arti­cle from my com­ment on the pre­vi­ous arti­cle. When do I get my cut, and when can I take over your job?

      • Anon

        I have a “holier-than-thou” atti­tude? Thank you for cor­rect­ing my spelling mis­take. How dare I let an extra let­ter slip into the word pas­time. I’m sure I’ll never live it down. And think­ing all the authors points were made sim­ply because you posted a com­ment on the pre­vi­ous arti­cle? Get over your­self. Some peo­ple actu­ally do share your opin­ions and views. I hap­pen to not be one of them, but Mr. Shelton appar­ently is. Have some respect.

        • Anon

          Edit: author’s points. I wouldn’t want you to take a red pen to my com­ment again.

        • Fhfdghdfghsdfg

          Lol this is from the com­ment, word for word. ” If you decide to test for ille­gal drugs, you might as well test for the
          most com­mon drugs on col­lege cam­puses: alco­hol and tobacco. ”

          Go back and look and tell me that doesn’t sound strangely sim­i­lar to exactly what this arti­cle said. The points were in the exact same order. It wasn’t just that sen­tence. But yes, I’ll have some respect for some­one who pla­gia­rized my com­ment and got paid for it. All in all, I don’t think that a person’s right to pri­vacy should be over­rid­den because of a few bad apples, so I’ll leave you with this.

          “Those who would give up essen­tial lib­erty to pur­chase a lit­tle
          tem­po­rary safety deserve nei­ther lib­erty nor safety.” –Benjamin Franklin

          http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/First_they_came%E2%80%A6

      • work on your delivery!

        You make bold claims — that is fun.

        I agree with much of your con­tent, but dif­fer in  your deliv­ery. Particularly when you decide this is some­how per­sonal. It’s an issue for soci­ety. And giv­ing up these rights is a slip­pery slope that must be resisted.

        As for claim­ing pla­gia­rism, another bold claim. You are also not the first to think these thoughts — did you then pla­gia­rize? Ease up there.… Take a breath. And share your opin­ions with­out get­ting so personal.

        • Fhfdghdfghsdfg

          Lol. No I did not pla­gia­rize, because I didn’t copy and paste and add fluff to some­thing some­one else said. It wasn’t just that he had the same opin­ion as me.  Read it if you don’t believe me. I know exactly what hap­pened, because I did the exact same thing in high­school. I wouldn’t have even cared if there was some kind of men­tion of the com­ment on the last article.

        • Fhfdghdfghsdfg

          Lol. No I did not pla­gia­rize, because I didn’t copy and paste and add fluff to some­thing some­one else said. It wasn’t just that he had the same opin­ion as me.  Read it if you don’t believe me. I know exactly what hap­pened, because I did the exact same thing in high­school. I wouldn’t have even cared if there was some kind of men­tion of the com­ment on the last article.

          • work on your delivery!

            And herein lies one of our prob­lems in soci­ety: Far too many believe the def­i­n­i­tion of pla­gia­rism begins and ends with cut­ting and past­ing the words of oth­ers. That is far from the com­plete def­i­n­i­tion of pla­gia­rism and what you did — despite your nar­row views of pla­gia­rism as shared by many oth­ers — is also a form of pla­gia­rism. In fact, it could be the most preva­lent, and arguably the most dam­ag­ing, form. Think for your­self — and then make bold claims.