Push for federal laws on
student travel will get backing in D.C.
student travel will get backing in D.C.
Recognizing the need for national, uniform safety standards to protect hundreds of thousands of students who travel internationally each year, U.S. 3rd District Rep. Jim Ramstad (R, Minn.), has agreed to sponsor the T Hill Bill for Safety Standards.
"The T Hill Bill for Safety Standards will help assure parents that their children will be cared for while visiting foreign countries,” Ramstad noted in a statement issued following a Washington, D.C. visit from the parents of a 16-year-old Minnesota boy who died while traveling abroad last summer with a student ambassador group.
Sheryl and Alan Hill, whose son Tyler died while on a People to People Student Ambassador trip to Japan in June 2007, met with Ramstad, and Minnesota’s two senators, Sen. Norm Coleman, (R) and Sen. Amy Klobuchar, (D), last week to discuss the need for uniform safety standards to protect kids traveling with third parties.
Read Tyler's Story HERE
At present, there are no laws on the books to protect children's health and safety rights while entrusted to third parties, especially while participating in sanctioned student exchange and travel programs, the Hills noted in a statement issued following the Washington, D.C. meetings.
“Children have been injured and abandoned. In severe cases, they have been denied health care, sometimes resulting in death,” the release noted.
“We received a wonderful reception [from the Minnesota Congressional delegation],” Sheryl Hill said upon her return to Minnesota. “Ramstad said he’d be honored to introduce the bill and thinks it’ll have no trouble getting bi-partisan support.”
Hill said the efforts undertaken since her son’s death to prevent a similar tragedy have been gaining support by the day. She cited a recent call from another mother whose 17-year-old son returned from an exchange student experience in Egypt weighing just 97 pounds and who was subsequently hospitalized for nearly two weeks.
The Hill’s have launched an advocacy Web site, www.tylerhill.org, to share Tyler's tragedy and advocate for safety protocols. In addition, the family filed a wrongful death lawsuit with the Hennepin County Court in Minnesota in January, and a formal Unfair and Deceptive Acts of Practice (UDAP) complaint with the Federal Trade Commission last month.
“What’s really sad in all this is that winning the case probably doesn’t change anything,” Sheryl Hill said. “What parents really need is the kind of change that can come from this bill. The hardest part will be finding which agency or department will be the enforcement group, Department of State, Education, Health. We don’t know yet.”
http://www.waconiapatriot.com/articles/2008/03/07/the_laker/news/news03.txt
“Children have been injured and abandoned. In severe cases, they have been denied health care, sometimes resulting in death,” the release noted.
“We received a wonderful reception [from the Minnesota Congressional delegation],” Sheryl Hill said upon her return to Minnesota. “Ramstad said he’d be honored to introduce the bill and thinks it’ll have no trouble getting bi-partisan support.”
Hill said the efforts undertaken since her son’s death to prevent a similar tragedy have been gaining support by the day. She cited a recent call from another mother whose 17-year-old son returned from an exchange student experience in Egypt weighing just 97 pounds and who was subsequently hospitalized for nearly two weeks.
The Hill’s have launched an advocacy Web site, www.tylerhill.org, to share Tyler's tragedy and advocate for safety protocols. In addition, the family filed a wrongful death lawsuit with the Hennepin County Court in Minnesota in January, and a formal Unfair and Deceptive Acts of Practice (UDAP) complaint with the Federal Trade Commission last month.
“What’s really sad in all this is that winning the case probably doesn’t change anything,” Sheryl Hill said. “What parents really need is the kind of change that can come from this bill. The hardest part will be finding which agency or department will be the enforcement group, Department of State, Education, Health. We don’t know yet.”
http://www.waconiapatriot.com/articles/2008/03/07/the_laker/news/news03.txt
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