Random Drug Testing in the Philippines Position Paper

Department of Education (DepEd) dictates the implementation of D.O. 40, s. 2017 also known as the "Guidelines for the Conduct of Random Drug Testing in Public and Private Secondary Schools on all public and private secondary schools in the Philippines." High school students will start to undergo random drug testing starting this September 2017. Duterte administration’s “war on drugs” prompts the execution of random drug testing to students as a way to address the rising drug abuse rate amongst teenagers. The purpose of drug testing is to measure the prevalence of drug use and to provide intervention programs. Science and Technology Education Center – High School (STEC – HS) believes that this order should be implemented because of the following reasons: it allows for early detection, it can serve as a drug deterrent, it promotes the feeling of safety, and lastly, it can aid in proper counseling.

The first advantage to point out is, random drug testing allows for early detection of drug abuse. According to DepED secretary, Leonor Briones on a CNN interview, "Random test aims to provide appropriate interventions to those who will be tested positive for dangerous drug use, which will help the student stop further use and/or abuse of the substance." Drug test will help identify students who are using drugs, in this way, the government will be able to control the growing number of drug-users through rehabilitation programs. Early detection of drug abuse among teens is vital as according to a 2015 statistics of Dangerous Drug Board of the Philippines, around forty-nine percent (48.85%) of drug-users started taking drugs in their teen-age years. This means that the high school period is one of the most crucial moments for drug use. In order to prevent future drug addicts, the government should first start addressing drug problems of high school students.

Second, this institution thinks that the implementation of random drug testing can discourage drug use among students. According to an article of National Institute of Drug Abuse about the cause of teen drug usage, peer pressure is one of the main factors of drug use. If a student will be pressured to use drugs by his/her friends, he/she can now have an easy excuse to say no to them. Also, the fact that the drug testing to various schools will be conducted randomly, fearful drug-using students will most likely stop taking drugs in order to prevent from being caught.

Some studies has shown that random drug testing actually helps in lessening the number of drug-using students. An Example of this a study conducted by National Center for Education Evaluation on 2010 entitled “The Effectiveness of Mandatory-Random Student Drug Testing.” The study reports that students taking extracurricular activities from a school that implements random drug testing had lesser percentage of drug abuse than comparable students from schools without random drug testing.

Third, random drug testing brings a sense of school safety and drug-free environment because it serves as an assurance to the parents, students and faculty that there will be lesser drug-influenced crimes that will happen inside and outside the school premises. In this way, parents will be much more willing to send their children to school, knowing that their children will not be harmed by drugs and drug-related crime.

Finally, drug test will aid in proper counseling. Drugs can cause a great risk for drug-using students to perform badly in class. If proper counseling and supervision will be performed early enough, these students would be still be able to catch up and not suffer major losses. In connection to that, the guidelines of DepEd Order No. 40 Series of 2017 have set that the drug-identified students will be turned over to the Department of Social Welfare and Development for rehabilitation and counseling. This interventions from the government will solve the problem of drug abuse among students.

In conclusion, STEC – HS believes that random drug testing is an applicable program for aiding and preventing the drug problem of the Philippines.  The order presents practical benefits that can not only greatly affect the present drug situation in the country but also in the future terms. Even if the institution’s deems the program feasible, there are still recommendation for the improvement of the program. First, this program should scrutinize the test process and the test results in order to prevent swapping of biological materials and inaccurate results, respectively. Second and the last, the government should make sure to include the rural or remote schools in the Philippines so that every student will benefit from this order.