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Peaceful dialogue and education coexist in campus coalition

Thumbs up to the students participating in the UCLA Coalition for Coexistence last week, an event sponsored by the United Arab Association, Jewish Student Union and Hillel Jewish Students Center. The forum sought to provide a peace-oriented environment to discuss the conflict in the Middle East.

Groups on both sides of the issue have boldly taken the initiative not only to educate the campus about the Middle Eastern conflict, but also to be receptive to each other’s perspective on the problem. This is particularly important in dispelling myths and stereotypes associated with the Jewish, Muslim and Arab communities.

In the past, tensions in the Middle East manifested themselves on the UCLA campus, often resulting in counterproductive finger-pointing and name-calling. This forum steered clear of these types of actions and instead provided for meaningful dialogue among students.

Though we understand the conflict in the Middle East is far from solved, we recognize and commend the students in the coalition who are making an effort to coexist and understand each other in a peaceful manner in these weeks preceding the anniversary of Israel’s independence.

New federal aid guidelines shows clear bias against low-income youth

Thumbs down to President George W. Bush’s administration for their continuing efforts to deny financial aid to students convicted of drug related offenses. Currently, question 35 of the Free Application for Federal Student Aid asks all applicants whether or not they have a drug conviction; answering “yes” to this question jeopardizes a student’s chances of receiving federal financial aid.

Though these measures have been in place since the Clinton administration, the difficulties in dealing with students who left the question blank led to a lenient enforcement of this law – but President Bush says that this will change and that the law will be more thoroughly enforced during his term. This has many negative implications.

For one, the law blatantly promotes inequality. It discriminates against students from low socioeconomic communities who depend on financial aid to attend college – a stark contrast to those from affluent backgrounds who commit the same crimes but can still afford to pay for college themselves.

It also punishes people in an unnecessarily harsh manner for “youthful indiscretions.” This problem is further exacerbated in California, where Proposition 21 increased access to juveniles’ crime records.

Along with these problems comes an increase in bureaucratic hassle when dealing with law enforcement as well as with students who don’t answer the question.

While the Bush administration may consider it important to curb drug use among youth, doing this by promoting gross inequality and keeping people from receiving an education because of a minor mistake is completely unacceptable.

Graduate student elections turnout, though higher, still too low

Thumbs up to the students voting in the Graduate Students Association elections last week. This year’s elections were the first time in 12 years that students had over a 10 percent turnout, the threshold needed for voter-approved referenda to take effect.

It’s commendable that turnout for the GSA elections improved by 7.7 percent this year and that elections were scheduled differently to encourage students from different professional schools to vote. Still, low voter turnout, which has made it impossible for GSA to pass referenda over the last decade, is still disappointingly low – as it is for all elections on campus.

Graduate students are a critical part of our campus. Since undergraduate students are only here for about four years, graduate students who stay longer have an opportunity to make long-lasting changes on our campus. In recent years, GSA has focused on problems that affect students’ daily lives, such as graduate student housing and transportation programs.

If graduates reach out to undergraduate groups helping carry out similar goals and also working on larger issues such as affirmative action, they will directly impact our campus on a grander scale and change it for the better.

Thumbs Up/Thumbs Down represents the majority opinion of the Daily Bruin Editorial Board. Send feedback to viewpoint@media.ucla.edu.

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