"Yes, there is a drug problem at Conestoga and, yes, some measures need to be taken, but this goes way too far," said Diamond, who has two children attending the school.
Deborah Rollins, Tredyffrin/Easttown school board president, said she had no comment. Another board member, Sandra Gorman, said: "I had no clue that this subpoena thing was going to be happening. I was as surprised reading about it as the parents were."
The issue of drug use at the 1,600-student Conestoga High School has surfaced since the Feb. 19 arrest of four students for selling narcotics near the school. The school district adopted a policy last month allowing surprise police inspections at the school. The first inspection - a three-hour lockdown, Gorman said, in which drug-sniffing dogs combed locker areas and the school parking lot - was Tuesday. No drugs were found. School officials said yesterday that the policy was not a result of the arrests.
"When we were working on putting the policy in place, we had a number of meetings to discuss it, and we never heard from anyone that it was a problem," Gorman said. "We have a lot of people who are frustrated by the fact that drugs are in the school and disrupting the education process."
Still, the grand jury investigation and the inspection have prompted some in the school, community and beyond to speak out.
The American Civil Liberties Union of Pennsylvania weighed in on the issue yesterday.
"We are concerned about calling juveniles to testify to a grand jury, which is an inherently intimidating experience," said David DiSabatino, executive director of ACLU of Pennsylvania.
Sean Connolly, a spokesman for the state Attorney General's Office, said nothing in state law prohibits juveniles from being summoned before a grand jury.
