All4Ed Flash

House Republicans on the Appropriations Committee advanced a major domestic spending bill, which would cut education spending by 28% and, in their view, “Reins in wasteful bureaucracy and enhances oversight and accountability.”

Let’s dive into some of the details. Within this 28% overall cut to the Department of Education is an 80% cut to Title I – the federal government’s largest K-12 funding stream supporting students from low-income families. This would be catastrophic and slash funding to levels last seen nearly 40 years ago. According to Committee Democrats, it would lead to a nationwide reduction of 220,000 teachers.

While Title I funding hangs on by a thread in this bill, the legislation proposes to eliminate several programs, including: 

·         Teacher professional development, or Title II, which now receives over $2 billion;

·         English language acquisition, or Title III, which serves 5 million English learners; and

·         Federal work study, which supports 660,000 college students.  

Other domestic programs outside the Department of Education would also be eliminated or see major cuts. For example, job training programs for youth funded through the Department of Labor would be eliminated. Head Start would be reduced by $750 million, cutting support for 50,000 children. AmeriCorps, which enrolls more than 200,000 people annually in service, would be cut in half. 

All told, the House Republican bill eliminates 61 programs in the name of “restoring  fiscal responsibility” and includes several policy requirements and prohibitions to stymie President Biden’s agenda. This includes a prohibition against implementing the President’s Executive Orders regarding diversity, equity, inclusion, and accessibility and advancing racial equity and support for under-served communities. 

Rosa DeLauro, the leading Democrat on the House Appropriations Committee, said in response: “We are witnessing a widespread attack on public education that should horrify all of us.”

While the bill still has to be The bill will soon be considered by the full House of Representatives, but the Senate has yet to release its own proposal. With that chamber controlled by Democrats, their bill is likely to look pretty different. Ultimately, Congressional leaders will need to come to an agreement with the White House to keep the federal government open and operating, a process that is likely to consume the remainder of the year.

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Federal Communications Commission Chairwoman Jessica Rosenworcel proposed $200 million to strengthen cybersecurity and protect school networks. Funding would be available over three years through a pilot program within the Universal Service Fund, but separate from the E-rate program, which currently funds internet connections within schools and libraries. This new investment would help school districts address the growing numbers of cyberattacks, which have caused learning loss, expenses, and headaches for district leaders. It’s also a direct response to pleas from over a thousand school districts and formal requests from a coalition, including All4Ed, asking the FCC to help “schools and libraries struggling on the wrong side of the cybersecurity poverty line.”

This proposal is one part of the Chairwoman’s Learn Without Limits initiative, announced last month. In addition to strengthening cybersecurity, Rosenworcel is proposing to expand internet access by funding Wi-Fi on school buses and Wi-Fi hotspots that students could check out just like a book from the school library. These policies are needed now, because federal funding for home internet access will dry up by the end of this year unless Congress replenishes the Emergency Connectivity Fund (ECF). While they wouldn’t replace the supporty 17 million students currently receive through ECF, these proposals are a step in the right direction.

But will they actually be implemented? That depends on the U.S. Senate. In order for Chairwoman Rosenworcel’s proposals to take effect, she needs support from a majority of FCC commissioners. The FCC is supposed to have five commissioners, but today, it only has four because President Biden’s initial nominee for the fifth position – Gigi Sohn – withdrew due to opposition from Senate Republicans and Senator Joe Manchin, who said he wouldn’t vote for her.

The Senate Commerce Committee approved Biden’s new nominee, Anna Gomez, along with the reappointment of two sitting Commissioners – Geoffrey Starks, a Democrat, and Brendan Carr, a Republican.

If the full Senate approves all three nominations, the FCC will have its full slate of commissioners, including a 3-2 majority for Democrats. That would give Rosenworcel the votes she needs to push through her Learn Without Limits agenda. We’ll keep you posted once these nominations hit the Senate floor in the coming weeks.

Thank you for reading our follow up blog. We will be back with a new All4Ed Flash next week. To listen to our latest All4Ed Flash, click the link below and be sure to follow us on your favorite podcast service and social media. You can find all of our socials on linktree by clicking here.

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On Friday, June 30th, the Supreme Court (SCOTUS) ended their session with their last cases. Two of the cases addressed challenges to President Biden’s student loan debt relief plan.  The first case involved two individuals that sued because their loans did not qualify for loan forgiveness. The high court dismissed this case because it “lacked standing.” 

In the second case, SCOTUS ruled that at least one state, Missouri, had standing to bring a lawsuit since they stood to lose money under the debt relief program. Reaching the question of whether  President Biden had the authority to use the HEROES Act to erase about $400 billion in student debt, the court ultimately held that this was an illegal use of executive power and overturned the program. The decision immediately ends the debt relief that the Department of Education (ED) approved for 16 million borrowers and the pending applications of millions of others. 

Justice Elena Kagan led the dissent, with Justices Sotomayor and Jackson joining, and said that the Court “declines to respect Congress’s decision to give broad emergency powers to the secretary of education. It does not let the political system, with its mechanisms of accountability, operate as normal. It makes itself the decision maker on, of all things, federal student-loan policy. And then, perchance it wonders why it has only compounded the ‘sharp debates’ in the country?”

Still, the Court’s decision only affects Biden’s recently announced debt relief plan  and does not change other important relief programs like Public Service Loan Forgiveness (PSLF) – a critical program for educators and public servants.  

In response, President Biden announced a “new way forward” on student loan relief and a plan to approach a solution through the Higher Education Act. Acknowledging the hardship that this decision will cause for many American families, the Biden-Harris Administration is creating a temporary “on ramp” to loan repayment so that those that cannot pay their monthly bills will not face the threat of default and potential harm to their credit. The Department of Education has also finalized a new income-driven repayment plan that will reduce monthly payments for undergraduate loans, and for low-income borrowers their new payment will be $0. Borrowers can learn more and check if they qualify at studentaid.gov where they will also find the application later this summer.  

Despite this decision, Congress still has the authority to act on student debt relief and college affordability more broadly. Though the Administration has started temporary programs, Congress must come together to support borrowers as the nation continues to recover and create long-term solutions to address college affordability. 

Thank you for reading our follow up blog. We will be back with a new All4Ed Flash next week. To listen to our latest All4Ed Flash, click the link below and be sure to follow us on your favorite podcast service and social media. You can find all of our socials on linktree by clicking here.

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On Thursday, June 29th, the Supreme Court issued an opinion ruling that the race conscious affirmative action policies used by Harvard and the University of North Carolina were unconstitutional.  While these cases were focused on these two university’s specific policies, the ruling will have far reaching consequences for every college and university across the country that uses race as a factor in holistic application processes. In a 6:3 ruling by the conservative majority, Chief Justice John Roberts claims that their ruling does not overturn prior cases authorizing race-based affirmative action and that how an applicant’s race has affected their life can still be part of how their college application is considered.  

However, the dissenting opinions and initial analyses claim that this opinion overturns over 40 years of precedent and will make it nearly impossible for colleges and universities to use admissions policies as valuable tools to increase diversity and ensure equitable consideration of student candidates.  

In a rare move, the justices read their dissenting and concurring opinions from the bench. In her dissent, Justice Sonia Sotomayor said “The result of today’s decision is that a person’s skin color may play a role in assessing individualized suspicion, but it cannot play a role in assessing that person’s individualized contributions to a diverse learning environment. That indefensible reading of the Constitution is not grounded in law and subverts the Fourteenth Amendment’s guarantee of equal protection.” 

Education Secretary Miguel Cardona said it best in his message to aspiring students, “we see you and we need you. Do not let this ruling deter you from pursuing your educational potential. Our colleges and our country itself cannot thrive and compete in the 21st century without your talent, ingenuity, perseverance, and ambition.”

While Thursday’s decision will be studied in more detail in the coming days and weeks, what is certain is that higher education leaders must continue their commitment to creating campus communities that reflect the diversity of this nation. 

Whether they are Black, Latinx, Asian American, Native Hawaiian, Pacific Islander, Indigenous, or White, every young person still deserves a fair shot at higher education. This decision should not deter young people from applying to colleges and universities or from fully expressing themselves in their college applications and sharing their talents, experiences, how they would contribute to the university community, and how race affects their lives.  

We will have a second post this upcoming Wednesday. To listen to our latest All4Ed Flash, click the link below and be sure to follow us on your favorite podcast service and social media. You can find all of our socials on linktree by clicking here.

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For many weeks, the nation anxiously awaited as we neared the debt ceiling limit. After weeks of tense negotiations, President Biden and House Speaker Kevin McCarthy came to an agreement on May 28th to prevent the nation from defaulting on its debt payments, which passed with begrudging bipartisan support. 

Rather than raising the debt limit, the agreement suspends it until January 2025—past the 2024 presidential election. But Republicans wouldn’t support that move without also setting limits for fiscal year 2024 and 2025 discretionary spending. As a result, spending on non-defense programs, like education, will essentially be flat funded from this year to next and limited to one percent growth the following year.  

The deal came with other tough losses for Democrats, including a “clawback” of $28 billion in unobligated COVID-relief funds. However, the US Department of Education has assured states and school districts that this will not affect any education relief funding, including:  

• The Elementary and Secondary School Emergency Relief Fund - ESSER
• The Governor's Emergency Education Relief Fund - GEER 
• Homeless Children and Youth - HCY
• Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, know as (SNAP).

Finally, the agreement officially ends the student loan repayment pause and codifies the Biden Administration's prior decision to lift the freeze on loan payments and interest, while also preventing any further extensions of the pause.  

Last November, the Administration announced that student loan payments, which were initially put on hold at the onset of the COVID pandemic, would resume either 60 days after a Supreme Court ruling on its student loan forgiveness plan or 60 days after June 30, 2023 – whichever comes first. This means that interest on student loans will begin accruing on September 1, and payments will be due starting in October 2023. 

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All4Ed is a national nonprofit advocacy organization committed to expanding equitable educational opportunities for students of color, students from low-income families, and other marginalized groups. We advance transformation from the classroom to Congress by advocating for federal, state, and local policies and practices that ensure all students graduate high school prepared for college, work, and life. 

All4Ed is located in Washington, DC.
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