House Committee Advances Pell Grant Expansion
Inside Higher Ed
Katherine Knott
December 13, 2023
The House Education and Workforce Committee voted Tuesday in favor of a bill that would expand the Pell Grant to short-term career training programs that last between eight and 14 weeks, despite opposition from some higher education associations.
To pay for the expansion, the bill proposes cutting off federal student loans, starting next July, to about 50 or 60 wealthy colleges and universities that are subject to the federal endowment tax. The American Council on Education and other lobbying groups wrote in a letter to the committee that this offset would “represent an unprecedented and harmful shift in federal financial aid.”
Some committee members raised concerns about the offset during Tuesday’s markup. Virginia representative Bobby Scott, the committee’s top Democrat and a co-sponsor of the bill, acknowledged the concerns and opened the door to rethinking the offset. He said he’ll be looking for other ways to pay for the legislation, which authorizes $160 million in new spending over five years.
“One of the challenges we have in this committee is that we have limited jurisdiction,” Scott said of the offset. “We can cut school lunches, Title I formulas and other job-training programs. So we’re kind of limited in what we can do.”
Continue Reading
Share
