DETROIT – Michigan lawmakers are considering legislation that would bar teachers from suggesting parents obtain psychotropic drugs like Ritalin for their rambunctious offspring.

Only two states — Connecticut and Minnesota — have adopted such measures.

State Rep. Susan Tabor, R-Lansing, who sponsored one of four bills on Ritalin, said she thinks it’s inappropriate for teachers to offer diagnoses of Attention Deficit Disorder to parents. The bills, which passed the House in November 2001, were expected to be considered in January (2002) by the Senate Education Committee.

Tabor’s bill would allow teachers to discuss students’ behavior with parents and suggest the child be taken to a doctor for evaluation but not recommend a specific remedy.

Those opposed to the bill said they think it would “tie the hands of teachers” and prevent them from having open discussions with parents. “It says teachers cannot even discuss with parents the fact that the child might need Ritalin,” state Rep. Irma Clark, a former president of the Detroit Board of Education, told Monday’s Detroit Free Press. “I don’t want our teachers being so strapped to where they’d be afraid to even talk to parents.”

The Ritalin bills also call for formation of a council to study psychotropic drugs and recommend when they are appropriate for use in children, and for distribution of literature on psychotropic drugs.

Jody Daniels rejected a kindergarten teacher’s recommendation that her son be put on Ritalin and pulled her son out of public schools in favor of a charter school 40 miles away, fearing her son would be labeled a behavior problem by teachers who want quiet, orderly classrooms.

“He may be ADD or ADHD – Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder — but I think he’s MCTTSWA – more creative than the system will allow,” she said.

© 2001 by United Press International. All rights reserved.

Published by Kettle Moraine, Ltd. on March 1, 2002