Following a vote by the Cambridge School Committee last month, Cambridge Rindge and Latin (CRLS) will become the first high school in Massachusetts to offer birth control pills and other long-term contraceptives.

The 4-3 vote, which came after weeks of debate among parents and town officials, allows school doctors to dispense contraceptive drugs through the school's Teen Health Clinic.

"We're very pleased with the vote," said City Commissioner of Health Dr. Melvin H. Chalfen, who heads the Cambridge Health Policy Board, which proposed the measure.

Physicians in the school's health center are currently authorized to prescribe contraceptive drugs to students. Under the new measure, they will be able to dispense the drugs directly.

School physicians will fill prescriptions for three different drugs: birth control pills, which are taken daily; Depo Provera, an injection providing three months of birth control; and Norplant, an implant that provides birth control for five years.

The availability of such powerful drugs, however, has at least one school committee member concerned.

Alfred B. Fantini, who voted against the proposal, said Norplant may have very serious side-effects including acne, weight gain, excessive bleeding, mood swings and depression.

He said 400 women filed a class action suit against the company that produces Norplant, but he did not know the result of that case.

Supporters of the vote said the policy does not drastically alter the school's role in administering birth control.

"The [school] health center has always prescribed birth control," said City Councillor Katherine Triantafillou, "It's not a radical departure from what has been going on."

"If young boys can get condoms, young girls should be able to have access to birth control pills," she said.

In 1990, CRLS became the first high school in the state to make condoms available to its students, serving as a model for similar programs in neighboring communities.

But critics of the vote said the measure will increase promiscuity and reduce the condom use among students.

A 1992 study on teenage health found that making condoms available in school did not increase sexual activity among students, according to the Boston Globe.

Robin Harris, a school committee member who voted for the proposal, said making contraceptive drugs available in school would be an improvement over the current system of condom distribution in combating teenage pregnancy. "I think it is a good idea only because we have had [467] girls in the high school who have been pregnant," she said.