Under the proposed DREAM Act, college students who are classified as illegal aliens could become eligible for U.S. citizenship.

Even though the Obama Administration is deporting a record-high number of immigrants who have been convicted of crimes, they recently leaked a “draft memo” which discussed different ways college students could avoid deportation.

“In a world of limited resources, our time is better spent on someone who is here unlawfully and is committing crimes in the neighborhood, as opposed to someone who came to this country as a juvenile and spent the vast majority of [their] life here.” explained John Morton, the head of Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE).

The purpose of the Development, Relief, and Education for Alien Minors Act is designed to help illegal immigrants who are honor roll students, star athletes, talented artists, homecoming queens, future teachers and doctors, or U.S. soldiers apply for their U.S. citizenship. The Migration Policy Institute estimates that approximately 726,000 “young immigrants” could become “immediately eligible for legal status” under the DREAM Act. However, the bill has been stalled in Congress because not everyone is keen about undocumented college students qualifying for green cards.

According to a report published by Educators for Fair Consideration, titled “An Overview of College-Bound Undocumented Students,” most undocumented college-bound students entered the country illegally as children with their parents, lived in the U.S. for the majority of their lives, and can speak English fluently. Apparently many of these undocumented students fail to learn about their illegal status until they apply for a driver’s license or a scholarship, or enroll at a college or university.

It is estimated by the National Immigration Law Center that approximately 65,000 U.S.-raised students who qualify for the benefits of the DREAM Act graduate from high school every year. However, only 7,000 to 13,000 of these undocumented students pursue a college or university degree because of the cost of education and the fear of being deported.

Experts state that undocumented students who graduate from high school actually “consume more in services than they contribute in taxes.” But according to a 1997 report released by the National Research Council, undocumented students who have earned a college degree could actually save the government money if they find employment after graduation.

As Sen. Debbe Leftwich (D-Oklahoma City) boldly stated, “Why invest all that time and money if we can’t help them complete their education and get a job?”

In order to qualify under the DREAM act, illegal aliens must have:

• Entered the United States before the age of 16
• Been present in the United States for at least five consecutive years “prior to enactment of the bill”
• Graduated from an American high school, obtained a GED, or was accepted into an American college or university
• Been between the ages of 12 and 35 during the time of the application
• A “good moral character”

Once the applicant has been approved and granted a Conditional Permanent Residency, they must either enroll at a college or university to pursue a bachelor’s degree or higher, or enlist in the United States Military.

However, the DREAM Act’s website clearly states that it “DOES NOT include any language about in-state tuition.”

States that currently offer in-state tuition to undocumented students are California, Illinois, Kansas, Nebraska, New Mexico, New York, Texas, Utah, and Washington. Undocumented students from these states can qualify for in-state tuition if they attended a high school in the state for at least three years prior to graduation and obtained a GED, however, this varies depending on the state.

To read up on the various state laws which specify how undocumented students can qualify for in-state tuition click on the following links:

• California
• Illinois
• Kansas
• Nebraska
• New Mexico
• New York
• Texas
• Utah
• Washington

To read up on other state laws which prohibit undocumented students from receiving in-state tuition click here:

• “Financial Aid and Scholarships for Undocumented Students“

As students and their respective families enter the 2010 financial aid application time period, those filling out applications should be reminded of a letter sent by Secretary of Education Arne Duncan last spring.

As just one aspect of President Barack Obama’s pledge to increase student participation in higher education, the U.S. Department of Education released what has been dubbed a “Dear Colleague” letter. That communication, dated May 8th, encouraged college financial-aid administrators to take into consideration any special circumstances that students and families have faced during the economic downturn.

The key aspect of the letter involves an effort to make families more aware of a concept referred to as professional judgment. However, while the letter sought to have schools take greater responsibility for making more families aware of their rights, those filling out application forms owe it to themselves to understand the concept and the current circumstances surrounding Duncan’s letter.

The Letter

First, The Chronicle of Higher Education describes the fundamental change that Duncan’s office was seeking. While families have always had the right to ask the financial-aid office to exercise professional judgment, many were unaware of this right. The Duncan letter went so far as to encourage “financial-aid administrators to reach out to students and families who may be in trouble.”

In addition, Duncan’s letter clarified the changing circumstances for which financial aid administrators should consider utilizing professional judgment.

“A changed circumstance certainly includes the loss of a job or a reduction in work hours or wages,” wrote Duncan, “but it also includes, for example, the income loss associated with a prospective student’s decision to leave the work force or to reduce work hours in order to return to school.”

The letter further indicated that professional judgment should be used on a case-by-case basis and requires colleges document the changed circumstances.

The Use of Professional Judgment

The idea of financial aid officers exercising professional judgment is simple to describe. According to The Chronicle:

Professional judgment allows aid officers “to adjust student aid to reflect a family’s financial circumstances not reflected on the student’s Free Application for Federal Student Aid, or FAFSA.”

In other words, schools are being asked to look beyond the numbers and examine a student’s and/or families’ immediate circumstances. For example, if the student or parent worked most of last year, the FAFSA form might call for a specific expected family contribution based on those earnings.

However, if the student or parent recently became unemployed or has seen a reduction in hours or hourly wage, then their ability to pay has been significantly altered. And for 2010, another adjustment involves families who took a hardship withdrawal from a retirement account to cover a medical bill. Normally such a withdrawal would be counted as income earned in that respective year but will not be for earnings in 2009.

The use of professional judgment was not something schools practiced liberally in the past. In fact, such a step previously held negative ramifications for institutions.

Previously, the Department of Education had used the professional judgment determination in its risk-based model to select schools for program reviews. The higher the percentage of students qualifying for professional judgment, the more likely the school could find itself in the review process.

The Duncan letter informed colleges that for both 2008-09 and 2009-10, the Department would make appropriate adjustments to its risk-based model.

Implication for Students

Students and families who have been impacted by the economic downturn need to understand their right to request that aid officers make adjustments even if such an adjustment is not offered. Such an adjustment could dramatically affect one’s status, creating a new-found eligibility for grants and other need-based student aid that a student may not have previously qualified for. Students might also qualify for additional federal loans and work study options.

The biggest benefactors would be those individuals who have been laid off or had hours/wage reductions yet are interested in returning to school to retrain. Those individuals could conceivably find themselves in a position to be eligible for significant levels of need-based financial aid based on their current employment status.

Previously, independent students who had been laid off had to report their unemployment benefits as income. The Duncan letter directs institutions to set that student’s earned income from work to zero for financial aid purposes.

But other benefactors could be current students who have had one or both parents lose wages. If a student or family has seen a recent paycheck change they should be sure to alert their respective financial aid office and seek adjustments accordingly. For greater clarity on who might be eligible, the Department of Education and the Department of Labor have collaborated on a web site that offers assistance to those recently unemployed.

Adding further optimism for students and families are a number of other positive aid developments. The maximum Pell Grant will be increasing to $5,350 for the 2009-2010 school year and to $5,550 for the 2010-2011 academic year. Those numbers are up from $4,731 a year ago.

In addition, the Hope Credit (now called the American opportunity tax credit) has risen to $2,500 for the 2009 and 2010 tax years (up from $1,800) and can be claimed for the first four years of post-secondary education (previously available for first two years only). The maximum income level for Hope eligibility is $90,000 for single filers and $180,000 for joint filers for 2009 and 2010.

During the latter stages of the Bush presidency, the outgoing president sought to put a positive spin on his ultimate legacy. In fact, throughout his tumultuous years in office, the outgoing president insisted that as time passed people would judge his accomplishments more positively.

Any chance for such a development seemingly went out the window over the last ten days with the emergence of the so-called torture memos.

Loss of Moral Bearings

With the release of the paper trail authorizing the brutal interrogation of terror suspects, President Barack Obama has opened the door on an administration that gave little thought to the long-term ramifications of its actions.

Leaving the option for prosecution to the attorney general’s office, Obama has clearly differentiated the issue into two categories: those who approved the harsh interrogation tactics and those who carried out the program at the behest of the Bush administration.

The release of the materials has most of the former administration scrambling. In an effort to dissuade the growing criticism, Bush Vice President Dick Cheney has attacked Obama for releasing the Justice Department memos maintaining that the methods helped protect the nation.

Three men currently seem to be most at risk of prosecution because of their role in formulating the legal decisions behind the interrogation methods. The three men are former Justice Department officials Jay Bybee, John Yoo and Steven Bradbury.

Bybee is currently a judge on the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals while Yoo is a professor at the University of California-Berkeley. The professor has already drawn a great deal of scrutiny on campus with some calling for the firing of the tenured professor.

While the men will clearly take the position they were simply doing their jobs, legal experts have suggested that the men could face charges that include conspiracy to commit felonies including torture. Newspaper reports also indicate that Bybee also could face impeachment in Congress.

New Report

Adding to the issue for the former administration is a new declassified Congressional report. That report offers detailed evidence that the “military’s use of harsh interrogation methods on terrorism suspects was approved at high levels of the Bush administration.”

This report centers upon the interrogations carried out by the military as opposed to those conducted by the Central Intelligence Agency. Offering an extremely damning portrait of former Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld and others, the report rejects claims that Pentagon policies played no role in the abusive treatment of prisoners at the Abu Ghraib prison in Iraq.

According to the Senate investigation, Rumsfeld approved 15 interrogation techniques to be utilized at Guantánamo Bay, Cuba. The report then tracks Rumsfeld’s authorization through a United States military special-operations lawyer in Afghanistan to the interrogation officer in charge at Abu Ghraib.

This led directly to Lt. Gen. Ricardo Sanchez authorizing the use of stress positions, “sleep management” and military dogs to prey upon detainees’ fears.

Not too surprisingly, former Secretary Rumsfeld has dismissed the report calling the findings unfounded allegations.

Time to Right Some Wrongs

While Republicans continue to fight any further scrutiny of these sordid matters, Democratic lawmakers and human rights groups are demanding hearings. These groups want to see punishment for those involved in sanctioning brutal interrogations that were tantamount to torture.

While the focus currently centers upon Yoo, Bigbee and Bradbury and the potential consequences for their actions, there now has to be a call to review the cases of some punished individuals.

If the president continues to maintain that those CIA officers that carried out the harsh interrogation techniques are not to be prosecuted, then it would seem only right to re-examine the military hearings related to the treatment of prisoners at Abu Ghraib. Clearly, the actions of the military personnel punished for their behavior at the famous prison were not, as the administration contended at the time, the actions of a few rogue individuals.

Janis Karpinski, the commander of Abu Ghraib, who was demoted for her lack of oversight regarding the abuse should have her case re-examined. And the seven soldiers who were convicted in courts martial and sentenced to federal prison should also have their cases opened in light of these revelations.

It is clearly way too early to judge the Obama presidency despite the onslaught of criticism coming from former VP Dick Cheney.

But if our former president was in hope that time was on his side, that his presidency would be judged more positively with the passage of time, it is now clear that time will only cast further clouds on his administration.

Given his authorization to torture prisoners, his name is now being mentioned in the same sentences as Pol Pot considered one of the most evil men of all time.

Today’s job market is extremely tough – so we will forgive those graduates who set aside their green philosophy to consider any available work. But if green is your color and your mantra, then you are not one who will forgo your commitment to a greener world just because of a tough job market.

At the same time, environmentally-conscious graduates must be careful to investigate the full corporate philosophy of a company to be sure that the public persona is in fact commensurate with that corporation’s business practices. If green is in fact your color, you don’t want to be fooled into taking a job at a business better known for its “greenwashing” practices.

Greenwashing

“Greenwashing” is the term used to describe the misleading practice of publicly claiming to be working on being better stewards of the environment even as some of a company’s real time practices act to pollute. In other words, these company’s public relations campaigns tend to be more about rhetoric than a real green commitment.

That said, it is important to recognize this is not about illegal behavior. It is just that within their industrial practices these companies contaminate either the air, the ground or water by discharging pollutants, some that are potentially very toxic.

At the same time that their industrial practices are less than stellar, these companies may fool the general public by virtue of using a large fleet of hybrid vehicles or harnessing significant amounts of energy from the sun through solar panels. They may also give off a green vibe by donating to environmental non-profit causes.

Therefore, “greenwashing” is about style over substance.

Measuring Greenwashing

Those graduates with a green philosophy currently out looking for jobs can turn to the web site 24/7 Wall St for a review of the top ten “greenwashers.” The list represents a number of corporate giants and traverses across several different fields.

The method used to determine the top ten “greenwashers” by the web site included a look at each corporation’s public documents including advertising, press releases, and websites. In addition, they took a look at each company’s lobbying practices.

To determine the pollution effects, 24/7 Wall St. queried the Toxics Release Inventory (TRI) program’s public online database. The database consists of the annual collected EPA data regarding the release and transfer of specific toxic chemicals and the waste management activities at specific industrial locations.

Using the database, 24/7 Wall St. “identified the companies which released the largest amount of toxic chemicals according to 27 different industrial codes identified by the EPA.”

Along with the TRI program, 24/7 Wall St. used other databases including the Political Economy Research Institute’s Toxic 100 index. In addition, they took a look at case law and settlements related to environmental issues as well as a company’s response to environmental concerns raised by agencies and the public.

If Green Is Your Color

So if green is in fact your color, so much so that it will impact your career choice, then you will want to think twice about applying for work at one of 24/7 Wall St.’s ten “greenwashing” giants.

College Cost Reduction Act “Soft” on Low-Income Students

The College Cost Reduction Act of 2007 passed the House and Senate, but is likely to be hung up with negotiations before it hits President Bush’s desk. Bush has threatened to veto the new measure due to the flimsiness of the bill in regards to low-income students. Many politicians have talked up the bill’s success, but much of this is marketing rhetoric.

As it currently stands, the College Cost Reduction Act is more oriented to post-college individuals, less focused on current students and those most challenged to get a college degree.

The biggest winners are the Pell Grant recipients—they will likely receive a significant boost in funds, although still far short of the funds once available only a few decades ago.

The bill cuts major subsidies to student loan lenders that offer the FFEL program. This action seems almost a reprimand for the past months’ worth of controversy brought on by unscrupulous and greedy lenders.

Components of the CCR Act:

• Pell Grants will be increased from $4,050 to $4,900 and a maximum $5,200 by 2011.
• Students pursuing a teaching profession stand to earn full tuition compensation in exchange for service in underrepresented schools. This takes calculated aim at the problem of inadequate teachers in poor schools.
• Forgiveness of student loans owned by public service professionals, including law enforcement, firemen, nurses, and even librarians after 10 years.
• $500 million in new investments to minority and underrepresented institutions.
• Student loan interest cuts for need-based loans.
• Federal student loan maximum borrowing limits to be increased.

“Drug Provisions” Remain Uncertain

Part of the proposed amendment to the Higher Education Act still faces an uncertain future. Currently any student convicted of a drug offense is summarily denied government aid regardless of how trivial the offense. Some sources suggest that the number of students affected by this controversial contingency is well over 100,000.

The FAFSA form requires applicants to answer the “drug conviction” question.

This “drug offense” measure was zipped onto the Higher Education Act of 1965 as the Aid Elimination Provision of 1998, also called the Souder Amendment.

With the unfolding of the current fiasco between student loan providers and college financial aid offices, one student loan company has seen the fallout as a marketing opportunity. MRU holdings is using aggressive marketing reminding students of the recent fraud. The WSJ reports:

One of the MRU ads called the relationships between schools and lenders a “racket.” Another said more pointedly, “Before you choose, ask your financial aid office about the lenders on their preferred lender list. Ask if any of these lenders offered kickbacks or incentives to get on the list.”

MyRichUncle is offering a discount on their federally backed Stafford loans and PLUS loans with the hopes of later upselling students on more expensive private student loans.

A Government and Private Sector Conflict

Over the last few months, Big Student Loan has been under fire. Almost simultaneously two big guns aimed their sights on the industry: first, New York Attorney General Andrew Cuomo in February, launched further inquiry into the alleged improper goings-on between some college financial aid administrators and student loan lenders. Innuendo had continued to swirl for some time alleging paybacks, stock options, and pay for inclusion deals for the infamous preferred lender lists published by schools.

Also in February, Senator Ted Kennedy had amassed reports of similar near scandals thick enough to make a novel. His solution? Write a bill—the Student Loan Sunshine Act—that could federally regulate the lender-school relationship, now clearly spun out of control.

Senate Cuts Deep Into Big Student Loan

Late Thursday, the Senate voted 78-18 to a slew of new cutbacks aimed at Big Student Loan, almost as punishment for the last few months of bad press and just plain bad business. Senators voted to make repayment of federal student loans forgivable for “public service employees,” like law enforcement and public school teachers, and to raise the amount for Pell Grant recipients up to “$5100 by next year, and $5400 by 2011,” read a New York Times article (“Senate Approves Major Overhaul of the Federal Student Aid Program,” Schemo). The major change most consumers will see is a reduction in their student loan interest rates over the next few years, and the FFELP lenders will likely feel the sting of sweeping profit cuts, the subsidies they earn from the feds. Seems that most Senators (and their constituents) think that enough is enough.

The few critics in the crowd argued that these newest reforms were a cleverly disguised ploy to undo the Federal Family Education Loan Program (FFELP). Senator Kennedy applauded the moves, arguing that students and parents have been increasingly burdened with the high cost of continually inflated tuition and costly student loan repayments, including the FFELs.

Colleges That Choose Affordability Over Money-Making

Well outside the political sphere other developments of a student loan variety also took shape. New England’s prestigious, Amherst College, officially did away with institutional student loans and replaced them, 100%, with scholarships. The move is a measured step by AC to make their education more affordable for all students. Only two other schools, reported the Boston Herald, have taken such bold steps–Princeton University and Davidson College.