High school students sneaking in prohibited substances to the Friday night football games is probably a pretty common occurrence around the nation. One high school in New Jersey is going the extra yard to try and determine which of their students may have been responsible for bringing in a can of beer at a football game after a handful of students were allegedly drunk and containers of alcohol were found on the ground near the student section.

How are they going about this investigation? By requesting parents of students to have blood and urine tests done.

School officials detained an estimated 75 students in classrooms during the football game in New Jersey and began contacting the parents of each. The students were then given a test to obtain a blood and urine sample, and parents were given two hours to have the tests completed at nearby medical facilities. Any student who did not have a test completed faced suspension from the school. According to the school district’s policy, failure to complete a test would be viewed as a positive test result, which is punishable by suspension from the school.

How effective was this method?

According to a report from the Daily Record, five students wound up facing suspensions, while the other 70 students were let off the hook. The parents of the five suspended students were then required to pay for the tests, while the remaining tests would be covered by the school district. That is a hefty price to pay for a school district, which has led to some complaints form the taxpayers who fund such actions.

“A few days have passed, and you sit back and you look at the whole picture,” Stephanie Pangaro, a parent, said, according to NBC 4 in New York. “It wasn’t handled correctly, but I think the intentions were good at the time, and it was really to protect everybody.”

The school district’s superintendent has stood by the decisions made by the school officials, while also acknowledging the inconvenience for a number of families. The hope is this mass screening procedure will prevent similar actions from being needed again.

[NBC New York]

About Kevin McGuire

Contributor to Athlon Sports and The Comeback. Previously contributed to NBCSports.com. Host of the Locked On Nittany Lions Podcast. FWAA member and Philadelphia-area resident.