'WEEK OF ACTION' SOUGHT TO HELP STUDENTS GAIN AID

There was much activism around the country this past week as the
Students for Sensible Drug Policy launched a campaign to urge
Congress to repeal the Aid Elimination Penalty - an amendment that
prevents students with drug convictions from receiving financial aid.

The Aid Elimination Penalty "Week of Action," as titled by the SSDP,
took place from Oct. 15 to 19 as student activists from across the
country gathered at various college campuses to persuade the public
to fight the controversial penalty.

Packages were put together and distributed to activists by the SSDP
that contained items such as "The How To Take Action Guide," blank
postcards and phone script cards. The main goal of the "Week of
Action" was to have every one of the 15,000 postcards filled out by
the public and sent back to SSDP headquarters in Washington, D.C., by Oct. 24.

SSDP recently won a $1,000 grant from the popular social networking
Web site Facebook.com and used the money to produce the postcards.
After all of the postcards are sent back to the organization, they
will be delivered directly to Congress.

According to a recent press release issued by the SSDP, the Aid
Elimination Penalty is being reconsidered sometime this fall as
Congress works to revise the Higher Education Act. The purpose of the
act is to strengthen resources of colleges and universities and
provide financial aid to students.

This past April, a record number of telephone calls generated by SSDP
to Congress seemed to be the final push toward the elimination of the
penalty, but the Senate approved a last-minute "No Pell Grants for
Drug Dealers" amendment that reinserted the penalty into the Higher
Education Act.

The main argument of the SSDP is the fact that since 1998, nearly
200,000 students have been denied financial aid due to drug
convictions. They believe the penalty is unfair because drug
convictions are the only infractions for which students are denied
aid - murderers, rapists, burglars and other criminals are eligible for aid.

Another argument put forth by the organization is the penalty
punishes individuals twice for the same infraction. According to the
SSDP, taking away a convicted student's access to higher education
after they have already paid their debt to society is excessive.

In order to get the attention of the public, the SSDP developed
attention-getting questions such as "What's worse? Smoking a joint or
murdering someone?" or "Can you take a second to help us keep
students from losing their financial aid?"

The common locations of posts set up by activists around college
campuses included areas such as dining halls, building exits and
on-campus music events. Activists even went as far as walking from
room to room in a residence hall passing out postcards to be filled out.

Although there were no activists on the Western Illinois University
campus, the Office of Financial Aid was fully aware of the activism
taking place around the country, and strong opinions were formed on the topic.

"I'm not in favor of connecting financial aid to drug enforcement,"
said Bill Bushaw, director of the OFA at Western. "Each should be a
different subject."

For more information on the SSDP or future events, visit schoolsnotprisons.com.