Posts Categorized: Student Aid

DC Shuttle: Gainful Employment Rules, Reducing Loan Defaults and Other Higher Ed News from Washington

On Thursday, the Education Department released the final "gainful employment" rules for vocational schools. In order to qualify for federal financial aid, for-profit and certificate programs will be required to prepare students for gainful employment by meeting one of three requirements: the average annual student loan payment is not more than 30% of a graduate's discretionary income; the average ...

DC Shuttle: Congress Working to Reauthorize K-12 Law, Reward Early Learning, Protect Internet Privacy

On Wednesday, the House Education and Workforce Committee advanced the first bill (H.R. 1891) in a planned series of education reform legislation. Under the bill, which was approved along party lines (23-16), $400 million in funding for over 40 education programs created under the Elementary and Secondary Education Act (ESEA) would be repealed. Republican supporters of the bill, sponsored by Congr...

DC Shuttle: Bill to Boost STEM and other Higher Ed News from Washington

On Monday, Sen. Olympia Snowe (R-ME) announced that she and Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand (D-NY) introduced legislation (S. 969) aimed at encouraging and improving science, technology, engineering, and math (STEM) education. The bill would provide planning and implementation grants on a competitive basis to help states integrate engineering instruction into K-12 education. Sen. Snowe said in a press rel...

DC Shuttle: Dreaming and other Higher Ed News from Washington

On Friday, Congressman Duncan Hunter (R-CA) introduced the first (H.R. 1891) of a series of education reform bills planned by the House Education and Workforce Committee. Congressman Hunter chairs the Subcommittee on Early Childhood, Elementary, and Secondary Education, and his bill is aimed at reducing wasteful spending in K-12 education. The legislation would eliminate 43 education programs in o...

Saving Pell Grants in an Era of Cost-Cutting

In the context of the recent efforts to arrive at a federal budget, articles abound in the popular media and trade publications debating both the value of Pell Grants and their rising cost to the U.S. government. Both pros and cons of the debate hold value. Pell Grants are what enable many of our low-income families to send their children to college and, when more and more jobs require a minimum ...

Tuition Fees and Student Financial Assistance: 2010 Global Year

Since the start of the global financial crisis a little over two years ago, many concerns have been raised on how it might affect funding to higher education and whether or not it might hasten moves toward greater cost sharing. While, globally, some steps have been taken in this direction, in most countries, hard decisions have yet to be taken on this issue. Our inaugural annual survey of global ...

The New Indentured Educated Class

If only they had their health … President Obama has emphasized the importance of higher education, and recently implemented ambitious higher education finance reform that will serve to benefit college students now and in the future. Although these changes are noteworthy, little has been done to help the many individuals who currently owe student debt, particularly private debt, and are no lon...

Failure to Launch: Confronting the Male College Student Achievement Gap

A few years ago, Mathew McConaughey and Sarah Jessica Parker generated big laughs and big box office sales in Failure to Launch, an absurd comedy about a 26-year old man still living in his parents’ basement, spending his days watching television and playing video games while the world passed him by. The film was closer to the truth than many of us have been willing to admit. Young American men...