Pubdate: Thu, 24 Mar 2005
Source: Good 5 Cent Cigar (U of  RI: Edu)
Copyright: 2005 Good 5 Cent Cigar
Contact:  http://www.ramcigar.com/
Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/2599
Bookmark: http://www.mapinc.org/hea.htm (Higher Education Act)

DRUG PROVISION SHOULD BE REPEALED

For years, students filling out the forms necessary to get financial aid 
from the federal government have had to answer a question asking them 
whether they have ever been convicted of an illegal drug offense. If their 
answer was yes, they were immediately declared ineligible for federal 
financial aid.

The purpose behind this is understandable. The federal government is trying 
to discourage young people from using illegal drugs. While the wisdom 
behind the laws prohibiting drugs like marijuana can be argued, the simple 
fact remains that it is against the law to use them, no matter how a person 
feels about a law. A person doesn't have a license to break the law just 
because they don't favor it.

However, by not allowing students who were previously convicted of a drug 
offense to receive federal financial aid, the government is denying 
opportunities to people who are not necessarily hardened criminals.

While it is proper to punish people for breaking the law, those who have 
been convicted of drug offenses have already served their time. Punishing 
these people twice for their mistake is unfair. Instead of allowing these 
offenders to rejoin law-abiding society after being punished, they are 
simply being excluded from mainstream society.

What is most striking about this policy is the obvious bias in it against 
the poor. Denying federal financial aid to a student from a wealthy 
background does little, if anything, to affect his life. However, students 
who come from families where money is not plentiful will be far more 
seriously affected by this provision. This law is doing nothing to 
discourage wealthy students from using drugs, but instead only blocking the 
poor from attending college.

This zero-tolerance policy makes little more sense than suspending school 
children for bringing plastic knives to school. It does not target only 
large-scale drug dealers who are threatening American society, but also the 
kid who smokes pot on his 18th birthday or the patient who uses medical 
marijuana.

Members of the U.S. Congress should carefully consider the adverse effects 
this obscure provision in the laws governing federal financial aid is 
having on students across the country. It has been estimated that as many 
as 16,000 students have been denied federal financial aid as a result of 
this ban. How many more students need to be deprived of an education before 
Congress acts?
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MAP posted-by: Jay Bergstrom