Starting January 2011 Brustein & Manasevit, PLLC will write weekly updates on this webpage with the latest news regarding federal education and workforce programs! So make sure to check back frequently! For more detailed summaries and analysis of these issues, please contact our offices about a subscription to the Federal Update.
Friday February 17, 2012 - The House Committee on Education and the Workforce, headed by Chairman John Kline (R-MN) heard testimony today on Kline’s legislation to reauthorize the Elementary and Secondary Education Act (ESEA). Last week Kline formally introduced the two bills, the Student Success Act (H.R. 3989) and the Encouraging Innovation and Effective Teachers Act (H.R. 3990), which represent the first comprehensive effort by the current House Republican leadership of the 112th Congress to address problems with the existing law. Together, the bills would greatly reduce the size of the federal footprint in education and erase the federally mandated Adequate Yearly Progress (AYP) system, along with other national requirements considered too burdensome. The legislation has come under fire, however, from civil rights and other advocates who say that it represents a step backward for many disadvantaged students.
A panel of six witnesses shared their views on what works – and what doesn’t work – in current law and how the bills may address those concerns. Chairman Kline began the hearing by acknowledging that he did not believe the legislation was perfect and that “no doubt” there would be “differences of opinion” over how to fix the law. However, he said, “I expect a robust debate on the ways our current policies could be improved to best help students meet their potential.” Ranking Member George Miller (D-CA), on the other hand, was aggressive in his opening remarks. He said that the bills being examined at the hearing “have the real potential to turn back the clock decades” in terms of the progress made in providing quality education to all students. Noting the positive impact that the federal government can have in education by assisting with the dissemination of best practices and mandating improvement, Miller said, “If we want to uphold the promise of Brown v. Board, reducing the federal footprint should not be a single-minded goal for this reauthorization.”
Thursday, February 09, 2012 – In an event at the conservative American Enterprise Institute (AEI) Thursday, House Education and the Workforce Committee Chairman John Kline (R-MN) announced the official introduction of two bills to reauthorize the Elementary and Secondary Education Act (ESEA). During the event, AEI’s education policy expert, Frederick Hess, blamed the problems of the No Child Left Behind Law on then-President George W. Bush, Representative George Miller (D-CA), and the late Senator Ted Kennedy (D-MA), who he said “dragged along” Democrats and Republicans to get the bill passed. Now, Hess said, everyone has “deep concerns” about what the law has become.
Kline, in turn, criticized Secretary of Education Arne Duncan’s waiver package, quoting an October editorial from George Will, published in the New York Post, which asserted that “the Obama administration considers the GOP-controlled House icky and the separation of powers tiresome, so it is dispensing with legislation in favor of coercion.” These waivers, Kline asserted, are only “inching toward” another “one size fits all model” and are not a true solution to the need for re-authorization. Responding to accusations that Republicans had “walked away” from bipartisan talks on the draft bills, Kline said that his staff had worked with Miller’s to try and find agreement. They came close to agreement on some things but not on others, Kline said, and in the end he decided to go his own way because Congress “can’t let this process stagnate; we must change this law.” In the end, Kline noted that it is not possible to create a bill that makes everyone happy and that he is “just trying to get the best bill possible” – a statement that echoes what Senator Mike Enzi (R-WY) said at the markup of similar legislation, introduced by Senator Tom Harkin (D-IA), in the Senate last October.
Friday February 03, 2012 – As the U.S. Department of Education (ED) prepares to announce which States will be able to implement waivers of the No Child Left Behind Act (NCLB), applicants are working to frantically revise and redraft their applications. Each of the eleven States which filed for a waiver of key provisions of NCLB in November of 2011 received letters the following month from ED asking them to address a list of concerns provided by peer review panels. According to the Associated Press (AP), which recently obtained copies of all applicants’ letters but Tennessee’s, the peer reviewers and ED had some harsh criticism for many applicants.
Though the high academic standards suggested by States garnered compliments, the AP said, almost every application was criticized for falling short in terms of accountability for all student subgroups. Peer reviewers also expressed concern that many applications failed to create incentives to close the achievement gap – a worry echoed in a letter sent to Secretary of Education Arne Duncan last week by Senator Tom Harkin (D-IA) and Representative George Miller (D-CA). One State, reviewers noted, did not sufficiently address the needs of English Language Learners. Another did not include accountability measures and intervention procedures for student subgroups based on achievement or graduation rates. In almost all applications, States noted that they would only measure performance of two groups – all students and a “disadvantaged” group comprised of many of NCLB’s former subgroups.
Many believed, following the issuance of these letters, that a decision on the waivers would be made mid-January. But with no news from ED yet, States who were hoping to apply by the second deadline in February are still waiting for some indication of what proposals ED may agree to.
Friday, January 13, 2012 – A week after House Education and Workforce Committee Chairman John Kline (R-MN) released the final and most comprehensive pieces of his plan to reauthorize the Elementary and Secondary Education Act (ESEA), views from officials and advocates are still mixed.
Secretary of Education Arne Duncan acknowledged the legislation, but was far from supportive. “I appreciate the effort,” he said, “but this bill retreats from reform, accountability, and bipartisanship.” Duncan also asserted that, absent a truly bipartisan bill, the U.S. Department of Education (ED) would continue with its plan to grant States conditional waivers of key ESEA provisions.
Some in Congress lamented the fact that this bill does not have bipartisan support, including Senator Tom Harkin (D-IA), chairman of the Senate Committee on Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions, and cosponsor of a bipartisan reauthorization bill in the Senate. Harkin told reporters he was “disappointed that [Kline] has abandoned the longstanding tradition of bipartisanship when it comes to the education of our kids.” House Education and Workforce Committee ranking member George Miller (D-CA), who excoriated the Republicans for abandoning bipartisan talks last month, found many things to criticize in the bill – indicating that there won’t be an opportunity for compromise any time soon. “The draft language abandons students, parents, and taxpayers alike,” Miller said in a statement. “It undermines programs for our most vulnerable students, shirking the civil rights responsibilities of the federal government.”
Friday, January 06, 2012 – Brustein & Manasevit’s 2012 spring forum registration is now open!
Given the copious federal rules, regulations, recommendations and often conflicting guidance, aligning the federal requirements together often seems impossible. This is especially true now that the Office of Management and Budget (OMB) announced they are collapsing key Circulars (A-87 and A-21 on cost principles, A-102 and A-110 on administrative principles and A-122 on audits) into a single Circular – to be released this February, which will significantly impact the administration of all federal education grants! On May 2-4th, Brustein & Manasevit, PLLC will provide the most up-to-date information on this new federal initiative and provide you with the resources you need to successfully administer your federal education programs!
Brustein & Manasevit, PLLC will bring together key officials from federal agencies with responsibilities in federal education programs and our firm’s attorneys to address the most pressing issues facing State, local, and postsecondary administrators and auditors. We will discuss reauthorization efforts of the Workforce Investment Act (WIA) (including the Adult Education Act), the Elementary and Secondary Education Act (ESEA), the Carl D. Perkins Career and Technical Education Act, as well as other issues affecting K-12, Workforce, and Postsecondary programs and the latest developments on audit resolution and risk management. We will also include a panel of State and local administrators to discuss their involvement in the resolution of one of the largest audits to date!
Don’t be left out! Because we limit attendance to ensure attendees have access to our attorneys, the forum is regularly sold out, so register early!
Thursday, December 22, 2011 – As the week winds down for the holiday break congress is up to its usual shenanigans causing turmoil all over the hill. There is a silver lining though, being that the debate is now over the extension of the Social Security payroll tax cut and not over the Consolidated Appropriations Act (H.R. 2055 omnibus) that passed both chambers this past weekend, with the Labor-Health & Human Services-Education bill attached, and was just recently sent to the President to be signed into law. Last week we posted funding levels as they were given in the omnibus without any of the across the board budget cuts included in the legislation. The U.S. Department of Education (ED) has now released its all-purpose table on the Fiscal Year (FY) 2012 omnibus.
The table shows the impact of the 0.189% across-the-board cut, however it doesn’t show the program level impact of the 0.189% cut to the FY 12 advanced funding that was provided in the FY 11 Continuing Resolution (CR). Pell is funded at $22.8 billion in discretionary funding, $132 million less than FY 2011, but enough to maintain the maximum grant at $5,550. While legislators fought for every inch to get this bill passed, a few items made it into the bill that were glazed over in debate but will have major impacts on programs. Among the things in the omnibus that the administration is the “least happy” about are the eligibility changes to Pell grants.
Friday, December 16, 2011 – Congress should be ready to send President Obama a year-end spending package tonight, narrowly averting a government shutdown and bringing to a close the contentious fiscal year (FY) 2012 appropriations process. House and Senate appropriators signed off on a nine-bill, $915 billion spending package, previously dubbed a “megabus,” Thursday night. Filling more than 1,200 pages, the giant appropriations bill is expansive in its reach that contains funding for a broad range of government programs, running the gambit from Pentagon fighter jets to Head Start school programs, plus tens of billions more for the war in Afghanistan. The “megabus” passed the house this afternoon with a 296-121 vote and will now be presented to the senate for their votes and then to the president.
With three spending bills already passed via “minibus,” completing the “megabus” will conclude Congress’ (FY) 2012 appropriations work. The agreement, placed on the back of the 2012 Military Construction-VA bill H.R. 2055, is comprised of eight other measures including the Labor-HHS-ED bill and had actually been agreed upon as of Monday. Democratic angst that Republicans might skip town before extending an expiring Social Security payroll tax cut led to a delay in signing the conference agreement since the two were bundled together. Congressional leaders opted Thursday to separate the spending bill from the payroll tax fight which will allow the bill to move quickly, with current government funding due to expire at midnight tonight.
Friday, December 09, 2011 – The text of a final year-end spending package would exceed $900 billion and is expected to be released in the form of a conference agreement on December 12th or December 13th. The top appropriators from both chambers said they expect to reach a compromise over the weekend during closed-door negotiations. That would give enough leeway for a required two-day advance publication of the legislation so the Congressional Budget Office can score it and then have the House vote on it by the middle of next week, allowing the Senate enough time to vote as well. Lawmakers are under pressure to act on a deal before the current CR expires and both houses recess for the holidays.
The monkey wrench in the gears of the FY 2012 Omnibus bill is the completion of the Labor-Health & Human Services-Education provisions (H.R. 3070), as Members are finding it very difficult to resolve nearly sixty Labor-HHS-ED policy riders, many of which are highly political and divisive, most notably of late are those altering the health care bill. Issues still need to be resolved on settling most of the differences on the Labor-HHS-ED, Interior-Environment (H.R. 2584) and Financial Services (H.R. 2434) bills.
Appropriations insiders have stated that the difficulties in the Labor-HHS-ED provisions may be too big to resolve, which may force the Omnibus bill to include both the bills they are able to complete and a long term CR for the Labor-HHS-ED bill and any other provisions not agreed upon. This would likely mean Labor-HHS-ED would be funded at current levels for the length of the CR, which would actually be a good outcome for WIA programs, as it would ensure level funding for the time being, as opposed to the deep cuts sought by the House to these programs. However the current 1.5% cut to programs would remain in effect if the CR language remains unchanged.
Friday, December 02, 2011 – Speaker of the House Rep. John Boehner (R-OH) has stated his opposition to a year-long continuing resolution (CR) and his confidence that congress will be able to move forward on the Fiscal Year 2012 appropriations bills. Of the nine bills remaining, the Labor, Health and Human Services, and Education appropriations bill is the most contentious even though Republicans and democrats alike have pledged to limit policy riders, mostly because it includes funding for the new health care law. The echo chamber here in DC has already rebranded the omnibus appropriations bill of smaller appropriations minibuses a “Megabus.” Conservatives are likely to lose half of their caucus due to the ramped up inflammatory rhetoric. Members who rode the tea party wave into office campaign specifically against such large and unreadable bills with so little time to debate and analyze them. Even so, appropriators have assured that there has been progress made toward the “Megabus” completion date of December 16th. There have been rumblings that another stopgap CR could extend through February which would would have the consequence of extending the included 1.5% cuts for for Title I, IDEA state grants, ESEA Title II Teacher Quality State Grants and Career and Technical Education State grants.
Friday, November 18, 2011 – Thursday evening Congress passed the first “Minibus” of Fiscal Year (FY) 2012 spending bills coupled with another continuing resolution (CR) to keep the Government funded through December 16th. There were over 100 House conservatives that voted against the measure, a mounting opposition that does not bode well for passing future omnibus appropriations legislation.
Members in the end supported a $128 billion “minibus” containing the Agriculture, Commerce-Justice-Science and Transportation-Housing & Urban Development spending measures, as well as the new CR to replace the one that expired tonight. The House voted 298-121 in favor of passage and the Senate cleared the measure easily with a 70-30 vote. The bill is now in the President’s hands and is due to be signed late Saturday by President Obama when he returns from overseas. But with one package down and 9 more individual bills to pass, the sheer magnitude of the legislative lift of multiple minibuses before December 16th seems unlikely, appropriators are admitting that a year-end omnibus will be needed to get the nine stalled FY 2012 spending bills passed.
Thursday, November 10, 2011 – With 7 days remaining the U.S. House re-vamped its spending totals this week and has allocated $14 billion more for its Fiscal Year (FY) 2012 Labor-HHS-Education appropriations bill (H.R. 3070) than it did in a prior version, yet the amount is still about $5 billion less than the Senate’s version (S. 1599). The revised House allocation is $153.4 billion, compared to the Senate’s $158 billion. At the program level, the gap is apparent due to different approaches that the bodies have taken in distributing savings from mandatory spending. The latter measure awaits Senate approval, while the House Appropriations Committee has yet to vote on H.R. 3070.
Additionally, In 12 days on November 23rd, the Supercommittee must report a plan to cut the deficit by $1.2 trillion or risk deep slashes to the Pentagon and other government spending. The Committee is actually required to provide the Congressional Budget Office (CBO) score on its plan at least 48 hours before it votes, which means it must have everything finalized by November 21st, just 10 days away. The 12-member Joint Select Committee on Deficit Reduction is to recommend up to $1.5 trillion in additional discretionary spending cuts beyond those contained in the Budget Control Act (BCA) in exchange for raising the debt ceiling by an equal amount.
Thursday, November 03, 2011 – Senate leaders appear to have settled on a strategy of moving fiscal 2012 spending bills in bundles. The first package passed Tuesday. The Senate’s first minibus (HR 2112) was largely non-controversial which includes the fiscal 2012 Agriculture, Commerce-Justice-Science and Transportation-HUD spending measures. The agriculture portion includes school nutrition programs as well as the spud amendment limiting the amount of starchy foods that can be served at schools; the amendment struck a chord with potatoes producers as they are singled out inducing strong opposition. The package is expected to clear the week of Nov. 14 as the House is not in session next week.
The second measure, expected to contain the fiscal 2012 Energy-Water, State-Foreign Operations (S 1601) and Financial Services (S 1573) spending bills, will be far more contentious with fights breaking out over Foreign Aid levels, assistance to Pakistan, Defense cuts, and certain to be added policy riders. House Minority Whip Steny Hoyer’s (D-MD) been talking about the 182 Democrats who have urged Republican leaders to keep spending bills free of controversial policy riders. Senate Majority Whip Richard Durbin (D-Il) said Wednesday that Senate leaders plan to continue advancing a series of fiscal 2012 minibuses but that the second package will not be on the floor until next week.
Friday, October 28, 2011 – Before a cheering crowd of Students at the University of Colorado Wednesday, President Obama announced that he will use executive authority to lower monthly payments for college students graduating in the next few years and will let recent graduates consolidate Federal Family Education Loans (FFEL) and Direct Loans at a lower interest rate. Secretary Duncan estimated that the loan consolidation program could help six million borrowers, who would be able to consolidate loans between January and June and receive up to a half-percent interest rate cut.
The President plans to expand the existing income-based repayment program (IBR), starting next year. A graduate’s monthly loan payment would be limited to 10 percent of their discretionary income, and after 20 years of payments any remaining student loan debt would be forgiven. Under current law, payments are limited to 15 percent of discretionary income and graduates must make payments for 25 years before loans are forgiven (less for those graduates who are in public service professions, including public school teachers and firefighters). Discretionary income is defined as anything above 150% of the poverty level for your family size.
The new income-based repayment program will only be available to new borrowers – those who have at least one loan from no earlier than 2008 and take out one more in 2012 or later. Borrowers who are in default on their student loans, or those who have only private loans, are not eligible.
Wednesday, October 19, 2011 – Consideration of draft legislation to overhaul the Elementary and Secondary Education Act (ESEA) stalled on Wednesday less than two hours after a Senate panel met to mark up the measure. Senator Rand Paul (R-KY) invoked a Senate rule that bars committees from meeting without unanimous consent beyond the first two hours of the chamber’s day. The move blocked the Health, Education, Labor and Pensions (HELP) Committee from continuing its markup into the afternoon.
Chairman Tom Harkin (D-Iowa) came to the floor to personally ask consent for the panel to continue meeting. Paul objected. The Chairman will now hold the markup sessions possibly tonight, at 8:00 am tomorrow before the Senate returns to session, and will continue to resume until Harkin can get through the mark-up. The tone of Hearing today became irritable as and Sen. Rand traded jabs over bill introduction, reading time allotments, and witnesses for Harkins retaliations over the freshman Senator’s tactics and greenness on the committee. The HELP committee had around a dozen hearings on the bill last year and this was brought up in response to accusations of insufficient vetting of the bill.
Wednesday, October 12, 2011 – Senator Tom Harkin (D-IA), Chairman Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions (HELP) committee introduced a bill with Michael B. Enzi (R-WY) to reauthorize the Elementary and Secondary Education Act (ESEA).Harkin stated the bill was a “product of tough-minded bipartisan compromise.” Harkin emphasized that it does not include all of his personal priorities, like early childhood education, school renovation and federal interventions for low-performing schools. To garner support for the draft legislation from both parties the there is a balance of flexibility for the Republicans and accountability for the Democrats. The bill is 860 pages with significant editing, and the concerns and comments from the education community are coming in as policy conflicts are discovered. The bill:
- Fixes the one-size-fits-all approach created by the No Child Left Behind Act by eliminating policies like the “adequate yearly progress” requirements.
- Ensures that every student graduates from high school ready for college and a career,
- Support great teachers and principals, and ensure that all children receive the best instruction.
- Focus the federal government’s role on the things it does best, while giving states and communities the flexibility they need to address the unique needs of their students and schools.
It should be noted that Chairman Harkin stated that the bill is likely to change even before the committee meets Oct. 18 for the first of four days of markup. After the markup the bill will be voted on in committee and then sent to the Senate floor for further debate and amendments. The Chairman said he hopes the bill is on the Senate floor before the Thanksgiving break. Summaries are available on the U.S. Education Department’s website.
Thursday, October 06, 2011 – House Republicans have painted themselves into a political corner where they cannot support any initiative by President Obama’s Administration, even if it is a position or bill they have supported in the recent past. From this standpoint the bill will not pass in the House in its current form and will be “dead on arrival” as leadership stated. Although there is a ray of hope in there, President Obama in his speech said he was not opposed to how the Senate jockeys support, even if it means passing it piecemeal. Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid has said there will be a vote on a new version of the jobs bill next week with offsets in the form of a surtax on those making more than 1 million a year instead of $250,000 (the jockeying the president was referring to). The President challenged Legislators from his first Presidential press conference in months Thursday, that if there is a portion of the jobs bill that would provide money for unemployed educators and responders and for school construction and renovation, that they will not support, they need to explain to the American public why. With These provisions the jobs bill is paid for and the Super Committee can return to its original goal of finding $1.2 – $1.5 trillion in savings without taking on an extra $400+ billion.
Also to garner support for the Continuing Resolutions that the President just signed, Speaker of the House John Boehner (R-OH) had to make a deal with the devil against his own party (Tea Party freshmen) to gain enough Democrats to pass the stop-gap measures. This puts House Republican leadership in a precarious position of being linked with Democrats when the current brinksmanship mentality presses that if you came to an agreement before the 11th hour, you failed at negotiations and didn’t argue hard enough. To pass any meaningful legislation now, Republicans may have to actually cede ground to democrats which will have to be done behind closed doors and maybe in connection with the Deficit Reduction Committee negotiations, or risk political suicide by colluding with the “enemy.”
Friday, September 30, 2011 - Rosh Hashanah signals the flood gates to open for education policy. The House Appropriations Committee released the draft FY 12 Labor-HHS-Education Appropriations bill. On Thursday, the House cleared a stopgap spending bill (H.R. 2017) that would keep the government operating through October 4th, giving the chamber time to vote next week on a longer-term measure that would run through mid-November. House lawmakers cleared the continuing resolution (CR) by unanimous consent. The house floor voted and passed the bill in under 20 seconds, a reminder of what can be accomplished by Congress when its Members don’t get in the way. President Obama is expected to sign the measure into law before the new fiscal year begins on October 1st. This Bill will provide more funding for Pell but will institute a 1.5% cut across education programs.
Seven months after his original deadline of Easter 2011, Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions (HELP) Committee Chairman Tom Harkin (D-IA) is prepared to introduce a comprehensive bill to reauthorize the Elementary and Secondary Education Act (ESEA). The HELP Committee plans to mark up this legislation on October 18th at 2:30 pm in 106 Dirksen.
House Republicans released the draft of their fiscal year (FY) 2012 Labor, Health and Human Services and Education (L-HHS-Ed) appropriations bill. There is no markup scheduled at this time, but the differences between the House and Senate on key policy priorities are setting Congress up for a rather significant debate over the future of domestic labor, health, and education programs.
Friday, September 23, 2011 - Today the President held a press conference to announce that Secretary of Education Arne Duncan will waive some of the core requirements of the No Child Left Behind Act (NCLB) to give States and districts both added flexibility and relief from increasingly harsh federal sanctions, bringing to fruition a plan that has been under public scrutiny since June. In a statement released this morning, Duncan said, “We want to get out of the way and give States and districts flexibility to develop locally-tailored solutions to their educational challenges while protecting children and holding schools accountable for better preparing young people for college and careers.” The President added in his speech that the purpose of the waivers “is not to give states and districts a reprieve from accountability, but rather to unleash energy to improve our schools at the local level.”
Provisions available for waiver include the requirement that all students be proficient in math and language arts by 2013-2014, the requirement that States identify schools for improvement, corrective action and restructuring, and the requirement that schools identified for improvement provide public school choice and Supplemental Educational Services (SES). The U.S. Department of Education (ED) will also offer some flexibility for rural LEAs and States in the ways in which they can use federal funding, and on when they need to operate a schoolwide improvement program. There will also be flexibility surrounding the use of Highly Qualified Teacher Improvement Plans and the use of School Improvement Grants, as well as the added option to use 21st Century Community Learning Centers and related funds to support expanded learning time during the school day as well as during non-school hours.
As a condition of the waiver, States will be required to adopt certain educational reforms in four critical areas identified by the U.S. Department of Education (ED): college and career-ready standards; state-developed differentiated recognition, accountability, and support; supporting effective instruction and leadership; and reducing duplication and unnecessary burden.
Friday, September 16, 2011 – This week a group of moderate Republican Senators announced plans to move forward with a series of bills to reauthorize the Elementary and Secondary Education Act (ESEA). While the legislation has not yet been introduced, text of the draft bills has been released. The Senators, including former U.S. Secretary of Education Lamar Alexander (R-TN), Richard Burr (R-NC), Johnny Isakson (R-GA), and Mark Kirk (R-IL), say they will move forward with a number of bills to modify key provisions of the law, many of which mirror legislation introduced in the House of Representatives by Representatives John Kline (R-MN) and Duncan Hunter (R-CA).
One piece of legislation these Senators are proposing would make changes to the requirements of ESEA’s Title I. Titled the Elementary and Secondary Education Amendments Act of 2011, the bill would eliminate the national Adequate Yearly Progress (AYP) system but maintain public reporting requirements and mandate that states set “college and career readiness” standards. Rather than setting out detailed requirements for labeling schools which have fallen below achievement standards and mandating steps for putting them on the right track, this legislation would allow the federal government to dictate interventions in the lowest-performing five percent of schools, but allow states to determine how – and if – they want to label performance and intervene in the other 95% of schools. Finally, this legislation would eliminate the Highly Qualified Teacher requirements. Kline has discussed introducing legislation which focuses on accountability, and may look similar, but thus far no details have been made available. A copy of the Senate legislation is attached.
Friday, September 09, 2011 – In an address to a joint session of Congress Thursday night, President Obama proposed a jobs package which he asserted would stimulate the economy and help put unemployed Americans back to work. Focusing on reducing the burden on small businesses, promoting investments in infrastructure and education, and making small but significant changes to the tax code and entitlements like Medicare and Medicaid, the President asked Congress to put aside partisan differences and pass the legislation before turning their focus to the 2012 election.
The President’s American Jobs Act proposal, to be introduced in Congress next week, would include significant investments in education jobs and infrastructure. Obama called for $30 billion in funding to avoid layoffs of teachers and other education professionals, as well as $5 billion to keep police officers and firefighters on the job – essentially a repeat of the Education Jobs Fund – and another $30 billion to renovate and repair educational facilities. Of this money, K-12 schools could get up to $25 billion – which the President said could pay for repairs in 35,000 public schools – and $5 billion would go to community college facilities. “There are schools throughout this country that desperately need renovating,” Obama said. “How can we expect kids to do their best in places that are literally falling apart? … [E]very child deserves a great school – and we can give it to them, if we act now.”
Funding for teachers, to be spent over the next two years, will save as many as 280,000 jobs, according to senior Administration officials. Districts could use the money to pay for benefits and hire new staff, and funds would not be tied to implementation of Secretary of Education Arne Duncan’s reform priorities.
- Brustein & Manasevit, PLLC is now on LinkedIn!
- You can now follow us on Twitter where we will be providing daily tweets about the latest federal education news!! Our Username is BrumanGroup.
- Brustein & Manasevit, PLLC is now on Facebook!! Become our Fan!