The Set up This is more or less a follow up question to something I had previously posted regarding comma separated values (explode,implode). Here's the scenario which has been stomping me the last few days as I'm a noob--sorry for the lengthy post.

I'm passing a variable via the url (index.php?id=variable), I then check the database to find the rows containing that variable using

SELECT * FROM table WHERE column LIKE '%$variable%' 

I'm using the wildcards because the results are a comma separated value with the variable appearing multiple times in the database.

So if we were assigning-- say schools to popular tv shows..my database is set up so that the user can assign more than one school to the tv show. IE.

South Park--> fsu, nyu ,mit Archer --> harvard, nyu

Index.php?id=nyu would display Sourth Park & Archer.

The Problem Because I am using Like '%variable%'

If I have the following: South Park-->uark Archer-->ua

index.php?=ua Instead of just Archer showing, Southpark would also show.

Which makes sense due to the wildcards...but can anyone think of a way to do this achieving the results I want?..Is there any way achieve more precise results using a comma separated value?..I'm completely stomped and will appreciate any help.