My organization wants to distribute a MS Word document that is
protected as a form, and includes a number of text fields for users to
type in some relatively lengthy explanations.

We would like for the person completing the form to be able to apply
color highlighting to words or phrases within their response text to
draw our reviewers' attention to specific topics. However, Word does
not seem to allow a user of the protected form to apply any formatting
whatsoever to their response.

Is there a solution or work-around to this limitation?

We are building the form document using MS Word 2002.

All suggestions are appreciated!