Five student athletes were suspended last week by the Voorheesville Central School District for using over-the-counter performance enhancing drugs.
The students were suspended for 10 days, according to school officials.
Principal Mark Diefendorf said the drugs were not illegal, or banned by the Section 2 rules governing high school students, but the district’s interpretation of the code of conduct yielded the suspension.
The district did not release the names of the suspended athletes.
All the things that we have, that we think the kids might have taken, were over the counter but it still might not have been in the best interest of a young person to ingest, he said.
Diefendorf said the code of conduct does not specifically ban the use of the products the student-athletes took, but it has not caught up with the realities and dangers of over-the-counter performance-enhancing drugs.
Diefendorf said the suspension was in the best interest of the students, and hopes that use of the drugs do not become a trend.
`Would other schools have done this? I don’t know.` he said. `We got the support of the parents involved.`
He said they are planning a community forum featuring a presentation from doctors and pharmacologists addressing the issues of performance-enhancing drugs some time after the Thanksgiving break.
“