Two students, Lindsay Earls and Daniel James, brought a lawsuit against the school board, alleging that the policy violated the Fourth Amendment's prohibition of unreasonable search and seizure.

[1] The Student Activities Drug Testing Policy adopted by the Tecumseh, Oklahoma School District requires all middle and high school students to consent to urinalysis testing for drugs in order to participate in any extracurricular activity.

Two Tecumseh High School students and their parents brought suit, alleging that the policy violates the Fourth Amendment.

The appellate court concluded that before imposing a suspicionless drug-testing program, a school should demonstrate some identifiable drug abuse problem among a sufficient number of those tested, such that testing that group will actually redress its drug problem, which the School District failed to demonstrate.

This rationale was based on the precedent Vernonia School District 47J v. Acton (1995), which allowed drug testing for athletes.