DRUG WAR MISTARGETS STUDENTS

Note: Amos Irwin is president of Amherst College's chapter of Students for
Sensible Drug Policy.

Drug war mistargets students

AS COLLEGE students around the country return to campus this fall, thousands
of their peers won't be joining them because of a federal law that strips
financial aid from students with drug convictions.

The policy is up for reconsideration this month as Senator Edward M. Kennedy
and other members of the US Senate Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions
Committee restructure the Higher Education Act for the first time in seven
years.

While the 1965 law was intended to make higher education more accessible and
affordable to Americans, the drug provision -- added during a 1998
reauthorization -- is an unjustifiable roadblock in the path to college.
Over the past seven years, more than 175,000 students have lost their
financial aid because of it.

The law not only victimizes students trying to turn their lives around with
a college education, it also makes our streets less safe and hurts our
economy.

People coming out of prison are much less likely to return to illegal
activities, including drug use, if they enter higher education. According to
the Correctional Education Association, only 10 percent of prisoners who
receive at least two years of higher education are arrested again, compared
with a general rearrest rate of about 60 percent. Blocking education to
ex-offenders only condemns them to lives without the financial opportunities
made possible by college degrees and makes them more likely to repeat bad
choices made in the past.

Public policies should encourage people who have been in trouble with drugs
to move beyond their past mistakes, but the drug provision endangers their
chances of becoming productive citizens. Graduating more students from
college means greater economic productivity and increased tax revenue, while
locking up more inmates means taxpayers must pay the bill for skyrocketing
criminal justice costs. Blocking education for determined students is
fiscally irresponsible.

One proposal, to scale back the law, would help some students get back into
school but would still leave tens of thousands behind. The minor change
would stop the provision from affecting people with convictions from the
past, but students convicted while in school would continue to be stripped
of their aid, leaving the fundamental problems with the law unaddressed.

Since there are already minimum grade requirements for receiving financial
aid, the partially reformed drug provision would only affect students who
are doing well in classes. Good students would continue to be removed from
school for minor drug offenses, many of them never returning to finish their
degrees. The Department of Education reports that among students who leave
four-year colleges before the beginning of their second year, 36 percent
don't return within five years. More than half of those leaving two-year
institutions don't reenroll within five years.

Partially reforming this fundamentally flawed law is like patching a gaping
wound with a Band-Aid. The Senate committee should fully repeal the drug
provision and reinstate aid to all qualified individuals who want to get
their lives back on track by going to college.

It could be another seven years before Congress restructures the Higher
Education Act again. As the ranking Democrat on the committee, Kennedy
should take a leadership role in helping students stay in school. If he
doesn't act now, another 175,000 students could have the doors to education
slammed shut in their faces.