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ticipate, Rave said. Students might try to take up activities they normally wouldn't so their suspensions are completed by the time their favored activities start, but they still would have to take part in practices while sitting out, he said.
• Sittig said the current law drives students out of beneficial activities by declaring them permanently ineligible after a second drug offense. He said waiting until a third offense to permanently ban a student from activities, which the bill proposes, seems like the better way to go.
• "I think if a student has a third offense, they've got bigger issues they need to handle other than participating in activities," Sittig said.
• Sen. Deb Soholt, R-Sioux Falls, said students caught with drugs should be encouraged to get back into activities. If students are banned from school activities, they may be more likely to use drugs when they have nothing else to do, she said.
• Rave said school districts can impose harsher penalties than state law provides. The state law deals with drug offenses, but local school districts suspend students from activities for using tobacco or alcohol, he said.
• The law kicking students who commit drug offenses out of school activities was passed in the 1990s. It was last changed in 2006, when the Legislature overrode a veto by then-Gov. Mike Rounds who was trying to keep the suspension for first offenders receiving counseling or treatment from being reduced to 60 days.
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Bill lets traveling med students hunt as residents
• PIERRE, S.D. (AP) -- A state House committee has unanimously approved a bill to let South Dakotans completing medical or dental residencies out of state get resident hunting and fishing licenses.
• Supporters of the bill say it will help recruit and retain doctors because medical students often have to leave the state to complete their residency training.
• Out-of-state hunters pay more for licenses than do residents, but a state Game, Fish and Parks Department official says the bill will have little financial impact.
• Rep. Scott Ecklund, of Brandon, says the measure could reward doctors who hunt and fish and may decide to practice in rural areas. Ecklund, who is a doctor, says passing the measure would show the Legislature's gratitude for students who complete residencies out of state.
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