What We’re Reading This Week, September 14-18

Posted on September 17, 2015September 17, 2015

Here’s a selection of articles that the Federal Relations team is enjoying this week.

Chicago, Illinois. In the waiting room of the Union Station (LOC) — Union Station, Chicago, IL (LOC)

The Science Teacher -A long form read on house Science Committee Chairman Lamar Smith (R-TX), his interests, and how the House Science Committee functions. Read it at National Journal.

Bill$ – Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY) is trying to downplay expectations on a recently revealed Continuing Resolution discussion. Right now, the expectation is that the CR will fund the government sometime between Thanksgiving and Christmas, which will give House and Senate Leadership time to discuss a larger full-funding measure with higher budget caps. Read more at The Hill.

Join Us! – A new Administration initiative is encouraging legal immigrants to become American citizens. This is one of five ambitious Executive Orders announced in the last few weeks regarding immigration. Read more at the New York Times.

The Debate – The Republican presidential candidates met again on Wednesday for a debate with CNN. It was three hours of sparing, zingers, specifics, facts and some exaggerations. Long and short, Carly won, easily. Here are some takeaways from Politico, the Washington Post, the New York Times, and Roll Call.

Fissions and Fractures – The House Freedom Caucus is down a member because of their tactics over…Planned Parenthood. Rep. Mike McClintock (R-CA) is leaving because he says that the methods used by the caucus are doing the opposite of helping the Freedom Caucus set the agenda, rather, they are driving the Republicans as a whole to do Nancy Pelosi’s bidding. Read more a Roll Call.

Senate Says No – Meanwhile, the Senate Leadership, which is Republican, has said that Planned Parenthood should be an issue for the 2016 presidential race and that funding or defunding the organization is not going to be the reason Congress fails to fund the government. Read more at Roll Call. But! The Senate will vote on the funding. Read more at Politico.

Vetting the Vetters – Two controversial picks for high-level positions within the higher education community have put a leading search firm under scrutiny for how their picks are being found, selected and reviewed. Read more at Inside Higher Education.

Clocks – A 14 year old in Irving, TX was suspended for three days and nearly arrested for bringing clock he made to school. Ahmed Mohamed was denied his rights (over three hours of being held the minor was denied the ability to call his parents despite repeated requests) and the school and Irving police force are maintaining they did what they needed to and did not handcuff, deny him his rights, and suspend Ahmed for brining a clock to school because he’s Muslim. Read more at the New York Times. #istandwithahmed

College Scorecard Back in Spotlight

Posted on September 14, 2015September 14, 2015

Over the weekend, the Obama Administration had two major announcements for higher ed, first the new College Scorecard and the inclusion of Prior Prior Year for Free Application for Federal Student Aid (FAFSA).

College Scorecard

The Administration launched their new College Scorecard, which rather than rank colleges as previously attempted, incorporates numbers new data points on colleges going back for several years so that individuals can make personal decisions as to a college’s value. It is a scaled back attempt at what the Administration has announced previously. Information published includes annual cost, average graduation rate, median salary after attending, average financial aid and debt, as well as demographic breakdown of the school and average SAT and ACT scores.

The new College Scorecard data does not rank colleges, but shows the share of a college’s former students who make some progress in paying down their federal loans within the first three years after leaving college. Additionally, the Scorecard provides the first comprehensive look at how much students, who receive federal loans and Pell Grants end up earning after they leave a specific college, both in the short term and long term, and if that is above or below the earning potential with simply a high school education. At present, the Scorecard includes the federal graduation rate, which only captures first-time, full-time students. The Administration has publicly committed to include a dedicated link to Student Achievement Measure (SAM) data on the Scorecard as soon as practicable. The Administration’s incorporation of the SAM, which is a long-term effort of APLU and the UW participates in SAM, opens the metrics up to tracking student movement across postsecondary institutions to provide a more complete picture of undergraduate student progress and completion within the higher education system. SAM is an alternative to the federal graduation rate, which is limited to tracking the completion of first-time, full-time students at one institution.

One criticism at the new system is that the government’s new earnings data reflects only the achievements of students who received federal financial aid, which could significantly skew the data and either understate possibly overstate the actual median earnings of a college’s former students.

Nationally, the federal student loan repayment rates underscore that hundreds of colleges are producing large numbers of graduates (as well as dropouts) who are not technically in default on their loans but are nonetheless not making any progress in repaying their debt. At present, the government only holds colleges responsible only when their former students get so far behind on their loans that they default on their loan debt. The new data also shows, according to the White House, that at 53 percent of all institutions of higher education, fewer than half of former students are earning more than the typical high school graduate.

Prior-Prior Year

Additionally, the Administration announced that students applying for federal financial aid can do so three months earlier next year. Beginning October 2016, students will be allowed to use prior-prior year tax data to determine financial contribution and eligibility. Right now, students have to wait until after their parents file their current year tax returns. The move will allow students to use tax information from two years earlier that is received electronically through the IRS rather than waiting until after the new year and the current year’s tax calculation.

Allowing millions of students to apply for federal financial aid three months earlier using prior-prior year tax data will cost about $400 million in the first year due to an expected additional 50,000 students getting federal aid and enrolling in college.

Such a policy change has broad support in Congress, but Republicans have also expressed concern over the potential cost. Additionally, Senate HELP Committee Chairman Lamar Alexander (R-TN) has expressed support for prior-prior year, but has stated it needs to originate from the higher education reauthorization and not an administrative move.

The College Scorecard is here.

Read the Obama Weekly Address on the College Scorecard here.

APLU”s statment on linking the Scorecard to the SAM data is here.

APLU’s more general statement on the Scorecard here.

September Budget Deal Looks Unlikely

Posted on September 14, 2015

Congressional leaders have given no indication they are in active negotiations on a long-term budget deal that would avert another round of sequestration. And there is little time left in the federal fiscal year to begin and conclude this type of deal with only eight scheduled legislative days between now and October 1st.

And between the Jewish holidays, the papal visit, and ongoing debate on the Iran nuclear deal, very little time remains for GOP leadership to build enough support to get continuing resolution (CR) approved by the House and sent it to the Senate. Congress must move some sort of appropriations bill before October 1st in order to avoid a politically embarrassing government shutdown. If Republicans want to adhere to their self-imposed three-day rule for considering legislation and vote on the stopgap next week, they would need to publicly post the text by Wednesday, when the House returns from a long Rosh Hashanah holiday weekend. So far, there are few details about the possible contents of the CR and its duration. Most importantly, it still is unclear whether GOP leaders will include a Planned Parenthood-related rider or language related to other issues, such as the nuclear deal with Iran.

Ultimately, we will likely see a CR approved just in time to avoid a government shutdown and then Congressional leaders will use the next couple of months to hammer out a deal on FY2016 appropriations. If they can’t come to agreement to lift the budget caps, we might see a strategy emerge to advance a year-long CR that maintains the status quo for federal spending and doesn’t trigger sequestration.

What We’re Reading This Week, September 8-11

Posted on September 11, 2015

Happy (almost) Fall!! Congress is back in session and here are a selection of articles the Federal Relations team is enjoying this week.

A worker stands at Ground Zero Wednesday, Oct. 3, 2001, in New York City. Photo by Paul Morse, Courtesy of the George W. Bush Presidential Library.

Exit Stage Right? – House Speaker John Boehner has not had an easy tenure as leader of the House Republican Caucus. During histime, he’s seen the rise of the Tea Party and Libertarians as well as more and more members of his caucus willing to openly challenging him on votes and for his Speaker position. As he looks towards what will be a hellish fall (a fight to defund Planned Parenthood, a potential government shutdown, the deadline to raise the federal debt ceiling or risk default, a highly contentious fight over highway spending to extend the highway trust fund, and a vote to oust him as Speaker is also expected), his closest allies are wondering if Boehner will run for Speaker or Congress again. Read more at Politico.

60% Chance – Congress has routinely fought about raising the debt ceiling in recent years. These fights have had significant political consequences for the Republican party because of shutdowns. As Congress, again, has to raise the debt ceiling, political forecasters are giving odds of 60 percent that the federal government shuts down over the debt ceiling…again. Read more at Forbes. Meanwhile, those 60 percent odds might be a little low. Read more from The Washington Post.

Planned Parenthood v. Debt Ceiling – Congressional leadership and the American people don’t want a government shutdown but the other looming political issue is the Republican outcry to defund Planned Parenthood, an effort currently being lead by Senator Ted Cruz (R-TX). While Planned Parenthood is not expected to lose all of its federal funding, how the House and Senate proceed on the issue, and a vote on de-funding the organization, is unclear. Further, it sets up a show down between defunding Planned Parenthood and raising the debt ceiling. Read more at Politico.

The POPE Is Coming – Pope Francis is scheduled to stop in DC at the end of the month to meet with Obama, hold a massive public mass where he will canonize a new saint, tour Catholic Charities, and address Congress. In a town that’s used to famous people living here and dropping by, preparations for the Pope have everyone atwitter. DC knows motorcades, but we’re not quite adept at Pope-mobiles…yet. It’s been treated as an inauguration and snow day all rolled in one. Read more at Roll Call. Or read more at the Washington Post. While the Pope is here, he will canonize 18th-century Spanish missionary, Junipero Serra, who worked in colonial California around modern day Monterey. Serra is not without his critics. Read more at the Washington Post.

Remembering September 11th on the 14th anniversary. Yesterday, a rainbow was seen over Manhattan, which looked like it originated from the World Trade Center. See the pictures at Buzzed.

Welcome Back Congress!

Posted on September 8, 2015

Congress is back from a five-week summer break and faces a tough fall agenda and unclear pathway for must-do bills that would keep the government from shutting down and defaulting on its debts later this year.

The first test will come quickly with lawmakers needing to clear stopgap spending legislation (continuing resolution) to keep agencies open when the new fiscal year begins on October 1^st. Moving the temporary funding measure has become a annual fall event on Capitol Hill over the past decade and enacting these measures is only getting harder with conservatives seeking to add politically toxic policy riders. Many predict that Congress will pass a CR through December and avoid shutdown but it will be an ugly and difficult road to get there.

Even if Congress does approve a stopgap funding measure, lawmakers face an even heavier lift in moving a final FY2016 spending deal that is likely to be intertwined with the need to raise the nation’s debt ceiling and other must-do bills that members want to see enacted this year. One of those bills includes the highway and transit authorization. Congress approved a short-term measure in July but that authorization lapses in late October. Members will need to decide if they can come up with a long-term fix or if another short-term bill will be necessary.

The most widely anticipated event on Capitol Hill this fall is not a legislative one but rather the September 24 speech by Pope Francis to a joint session of Congress. There have been more requests for gallery tickets to see the first-ever appearance of a pontiff before lawmakers than anyone can recall for other heads of state. Some say strong remarks from the leader of the Roman Catholic Church calling for an immigration overhaul or rebuking US foreign policy might even spur lawmakers to action. Indeed, Francis’ appearance only adds to the uncertainty that will mark the final months of the first session of the 114th Congress.