Colorado Students Permitted to Use Medical Cannabis in Schools

Legislation is awaiting action from Colorado Gov. John Hickenlooper to allow students’ access to medicinal marijuana products while on school grounds.

House and Senate lawmakers recently approved legislation – House Bill 1373, the Student Medical Marijuana Use at School Act (a.k.a. Jack’s Law) – to permit primary caregivers the option to administer non-smoked forms of medical marijuana to qualified patients while they are enrolled in preschool, primary or secondary school. The pending law is named after 15-year-old Jack Splitt, who suffers from spastic quadriplegic cerebral palsy and dystonia and requires round-the-clock access to cannabis therapy.

“My son, if he needed medical marijuana and he needed it during the day while he was in school, I’d want him to have that opportunity,” Hickenlooper stated. “Those kids have every right and expect that they should be able to have access to those medicines, and they haven’t. My hope is that this bill… motivates those schools to make sure these kids can get the medication they apparently need.”

The measure will take immediate effect once it’s signed into law. Presently, only New Jersey provides explicit statutory language permitting qualified patients access to cannabis while on school grounds.

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