Students Face Unjust Penalty

In our most recent convocation, President Fred Gainous told Florida A&M University students that the university wouldn’t tolerate students that haven’t paid their tuition fees by the September 23 deadline.

Even if they are out of state students on university-provided scholarships, eighteen hundred students may face cancellation of their classes.

In essence, students are being punished for the sins of an administration.

Why should the student body and their parents be asked to pay out of pocket for fees timely financial aid would have provided?

Why should we have to worry about the status of our classes when a more responsible staff could have prevented this whole predicament?

With delays that include lost paperwork and new tax verification forms, there’s no telling when students will receive their money. Others have advised that those threatened with cancelled classes take out loans.

While this seems like a helpful suggestion, students who are underage, unfamiliar with the loan process or already plagued with bad credit the solution presents more hassles and stress than solutions.

Even though the administration ensures that all students receiving financial aid will be reinstated to their classes as soon as possible, the idea that any student’s classes would be cancelled is unacceptable. Mistakes within administration are to be expected but when students’ grades are jeopardized because of them, lines have to be drawn.

Before demanding punctuality from its students, the university must demand it from its own departments.

Marie Frasier for The Famuan