Every year Earlham College automatically charges $979 to each of its students if they do not sign a health insurance waiver by July 31. Despite the fact that other insurance companies allow you to cancel their coverage and go to a different insurance company past their deadlines, Earlham states that there is no way to reverse the charge. This default of charging Earlham students needs to change. If someone requests the insurance, they should give it to them. If they do not request it, they should not receive it and should not be fined. This charge is not only unbelievably steep, but it is threatening the completion of degrees. Kyle Dickerson and I (and perhaps others) have been charged and we absolutely cannot afford to pay this fine. We should not have to, given that we have our own insurance through our parents that we do not have to pay for. We have never asked for Earlham's insurance in the three years we have attended. We understand that if we had just turned the waivers in on time, we would not be charged. However, we think the system as it is now is deeply flawed. We should not worry that we won't be able to pay to attend our senior year because we forgot to sign one paper during a hectic summer. We are already receiving all the loans possible, and we worry that if this fine is not reversed we will not be able to go abroad this upcoming fall. If you sign this, we hope you would help us reverse this charge and change the default system to something more practical, and less likely to rope students into having to pay money they do not have for something they do not need.