AMENDMENT 4SEARCHES AND SEIZURE cause, [u]nlike most private citizens or government employees generally, they have a diminished expectation of privacy. 387

Emphasizing the special needs of the public school context, reected in the custodial and tutelary power that schools exercise over students, and also noting schoolchildrens diminished expectation of privacy, the Court in Vernonia School District v. Acton 388 upheld a school districts policy authorizing random urinalysis drug testing of students who participate in interscholastic athletics. The Court redened the term compelling governmental interest. The phrase does not describe a xed, minimum quantum of governmental concern, the Court explained, but rather describes an interest which appears important enough to justify the particular search at hand. 389 Applying this standard, the Court concluded that deterring drug use by our Nations schoolchildren is at least as important as enhancing efficient enforcement of the Nations laws against the importation of drugs . . . or deterring drug use by engineers and trainmen. 390 On the other hand, the interference with privacy interests

Moreover, [l]egitimate privacy expectations are even less [for] student athletes, since they normally suit up, shower, and dress in locker rooms that afford no privacy, and since they voluntarily subject themselves to physical exams and other regulations above and beyond those imposed on non-athletes. 391 The Court caution[ed] against the assumption that suspicionless drug testing will readily pass muster in other contexts, identifying as the most signicant element in Vernonia the fact that the policy was implemented under the governments responsibilities as guardian and tutor of schoolchildren.392

Seven years later, the Court in Board of Education v. Earls 393 extended Vernonia to uphold a school systems drug testing of all junior high and high school students who participated in extracurricular activities. The lowered expectation of privacy that athletes have was not essential to the decision in Vernonia, Justice Thomas wrote for a 54 Court majority.394 Rather, that decision depended primarily upon the schools custodial responsibility and au387 489 U.S. at 672. 388 515 U.S. 646 (1995). 389 515 U.S. at 661. 390 515 U.S. at 661. 391 515 U.S. at 657. 392 515 U.S. at 665. 393 536 U.S. 822 (2002). 394 536 U.S. at 831. AMENDMENT 4SEARCHES AND SEIZURE