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Jus' Mom · #1 09-03-2003, 05:07 AM

Financial Aid -Drug Convictions Bar Students From Receiving Federal Funds but Arsonists, burglars and convicted felons can still qualify for aid. http://www.collegejournal.com/aidadm...29-golden.html

deb · #2 09-03-2003, 05:36 AM

I think a person's past should stay in their past and a person who was once in should qualify later for financial aid no matter what they were in for. Note that they said that the college/university nor the Department of Education check if the person answered correctly and that a person who answers "No" gets financial aid, but if they answer yes or leave it blank they don't.... Something to think about....

Deb

samiam158 · #3 09-03-2003, 06:12 AM

Are we talking about while or after they get out of prison???I know my son was able to get financial aid and i thought it was odd that drug criminals were not allow to get it...also if they are convicted of a drug crime they can not get certain tax credits.....weird

Jus' Mom · #4 09-03-2003, 02:57 PM

This is what I pulled up with a google search. To me it sounds like (as the last sentence says) in prison and out. I'll see if they have a contact number and ask them. There seems to be a difference between financial assistance which is like Pell Grants (inmates can no longer get these since I believe I read 1994) and financial aid. I read a long article about all that but didn't post it cause I figured no one would want to read something so lengthy. If you'd like I could find it and post the link. Supposedly, financial aid they can still get.

CollegeJournal | News & Trends
... because he can't get the federal financial assistance he needs ... the prison so he can
qualify for financial aid ... to pursue his college studies in prison and after ...
www.collegejournal.com/aidadmissions/ newstrends/20010929-golden.html

samiam158 · #5 09-03-2003, 03:01 PM

Well my son did all the leg work and got a pell grant for 4200 and then he decided that he wanted to go back to prison....so i was just wondering if it counted while in prison...maybe he'll do something constructive and all his information has been approved for the school year 03-04...

DeNada · #6 09-12-2003, 10:18 PM

I've been looking into this too and when I called the FAFSA folks, they said NO federal financial aid is available while the person is incarcerated. They can qualify after release if they don't have a drug conviction. Interesting distinction!!! not. I'm doggedly hunting some kind of aid for my son and will post anything I find!

justvicki · #7 09-12-2003, 11:40 PM

I qualified for Pell and subsidized and unsubsidized student loans after I did four years prison time in West Virgina. I am currently a full-time college student. My conviction, however, was not drug related. I think you can still qualify for Pell with a drug conviction, but there is a time limit on it, i.e., so many many months after the conviction, etc.

samiam158 · #8 09-13-2003, 06:10 AM

you know guys gal i think your right....i think they have to have complete a certain drug course or rehab or something like that.....yeah now i remember

Jus' Mom · #9 09-13-2003, 10:06 PM

I've called and emailed FAFSA. Each time, it's like I get a different answer when asking if they can get assistance while still in prison. On another FAFSA site (can't remember how I got there) it said to fill out the app and send it in. If they don't qualify for one kind of assistance there are others that they might. Here is the FAFSA url:

http://www.fafsa.ed.gov/

Jus' Mom · #10 09-13-2003, 10:23 PM

Check out the last paragraph here! I added the site I got this from so you can see it came from a legit source......

The financial-aid ban is one of several federal measures enacted during the past decade restricting drug offenders' access to government benefits. A 1992 law prodded states -- on penalty of losing highway-construction funds -- to pass legislation revoking drivers' licenses of drug offenders for a minimum of six months. Seventeen of them did. A 1996 federal law prohibits people convicted of drug felonies from ever receiving welfare or food stamps. Since then, 27 states have modified or eliminated that ban.

Other federal legislation bars drug offenders from subsidized or public housing for at least three years. Some local housing authorities have extended that waiting period to five years.

In 1994, Congress eliminated the federal government's main student grant program, Pell grants, for inmates in state and federal prisons, ending higher education in most of those facilities. Ms. Burke, the Hampden County prison's education coordinator, says that at least half a dozen inmates there have declined transfers to lower-security state facilities so they can keep taking college courses at the county jail.

Drug offenders who lie on the financial-aid form usually qualify for aid because neither the government nor universities seek to verify responses. "The Al Capone of drug dealers could answer no, and there are no checks," says David Allen, financial-aid director at Bristol Community College in Fall River, Mass. Ms. Kozberg, the Education Department spokeswoman, says the goverment checks answers to all questions on a sample of applications but doesn't pay special attention to the drug responses.

http://www.collegejournal.com/aidadm...29-golden.html

jamiefromtx · #11 09-14-2003, 06:25 AM

I HAVE received federal financial aid and I was convicted of a drug related felony.

If you have completed any type of substance abuse treatment program you are eligible. I was sent to SAFP in Texas and completed the after care program. I am not sure about other states but it was my understanding that if one did COMPLETE a program they are eligible. I took a letter from the outpatient program.

Good Luck and dont give up!!!

We learn best through adversity!!!

life2thesequel · #12 09-14-2003, 07:19 AM

Google PLRA.. The legislation that has caused many of the funded organizations and programs to go into the ether.

In the event that money fell from the sky at a prisoner who could actually afford the tuition.... The problem then is logistic.

As an individual doing 'correspondence' courses, they'd be restricted by whatever institutional policies would govern how much personal property (books and whatnot) would come their way.

If a handful of people in a given prison manage to afford the same course, it would take an act of DOC and God to bring a particular 'visiting' instructor in to the prison to teach the course.

Before Pell's vaporized, KCIW had 2 college programs. A local community college was partnered with DOC to teach it onsite.
There were only BA (2 year) programs offered. They had a minimum of 6 people in it --or they'd not come... If anyone got locked down in the midst of it, the program could be pulled. The materials were brought in by the instructors and waived by DOC as extraneous property.

I asked the instructor why they'd not offer some 4 year degrees. Simple answer. To be the equivalent of the 'civilian' 4 year degree, there would be other requisite courses that simply could not or would not be completed.

The first was the 'lab' study. Anything from biology, to chemistry, to astronomy... DOC frowns on chemical contraband and would never go for letting anyone out at night to stargaze.

The second would be the 'language' requirement. There would be a need for the same 6 folks to decide on and pass (collectively) a second language course. This from folks to whom the fact that English has rules (no one employs) would be news..

Sponsored courses within prisons come at the pleasure of the DOC and the insistance of the residents when they have.

DeNada · #13 09-20-2003, 09:17 PM

the whole thing is a bunch of crap. period.

terrellsgirl · #14 10-25-2003, 03:01 PM

It's me Terrellsgirl and I know it's been a while since anyone has heard from me but the reason why I'm here now is because Edgar and I need help and this site is the only positive alternative for us I need someone too contact me at my own personal web site for information we both need. I desire positive answers too my questions. I need answers because he will be home in 9 months. I have asked about how I could get too Ina Illinois I'm sure someone knows; Iasked if any one could help with us seeing each other I we wrote because we didn't get the support here, I asked if someone would help in any way no one contacts me and I only been here a short time . I am not complaining i am merely stating that We need help. Please respond. Terrellgirl

cool:

sad at the same time I definitely have mixed emotions here . I'm still looking for work and have no positive leads HElllllllllllllllllllllllllp! I request info on financial assistance for housing and for the assistance of locating info to get too Ina Illinois on the bus if any. Please respond Terrellsgirl:fb:

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