Higher Education Amendments Of 2007

Floor Speech

HIGHER EDUCATION AMENDMENTS OF 2007 -- (Senate - July 24, 2007)

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Mr. REED. Mr. President, I strongly support passage of S. 1642, the Higher Education Amendments of 2007.

This important bipartisan legislation, which I helped craft as a Member of the Senate Education Committee, would reauthorize the Higher Education Act for the first time since 1998, expand college access and affordability for students and their families, and ensure that teachers have the necessary skills and supports to effectively raise student achievement in the classroom.

This bill builds on our passage last week of the Higher Education Access Act, which makes a nearly $14 billion investment in additional need-based grant assistance for low-income students. That bill also helps middle-class students and families pay down and manage their loan debt by capping monthly loan payments at 15 percent of their discretionary income. And it sends a signal about the need for more talented young people to become nurses, teachers, and librarians by offering them loan forgiveness if they continue in public-service professions for 10 years.

Earlier this year, I introduced a bill aimed at making it easier for families to fill out the financial aid form that all students have to fill out to see if they can get tuition assistance. I called the bill the FAFSA Act, Financial Aid Form Simplification and Access Act. It is based on the recommendations of experts and should help make a sometimes difficult process less time consuming and frustrating. First, it would phase out the complex, one-size-fits-all long form at 7 pages and over 90 questions, using the savings to employ ``smart'' technology to create a tailored online application form to ensure that students answer only the minimum number of questions necessary. Second, the bill would establish a short paper EZ-FAFSA application form, similar to the IRS's 1040-EZ, for the lowest-income students. Third, this legislation allows students to apply for financial aid earlier, and it creates a pilot program to test an early application system under which students apply for aid and receive an aid estimate or determination in their junior year of high school. I am pleased that these provisions are included in the bill the Senate is passing today.

The Higher Education Amendments of 2007 also include provisions from another bill that I introduced earlier this year, the ACCESS Act. Accessing College through Comprehensive Early Outreach and State Partnerships Act--S. 938, modeled on successful programs like Indiana's 21st Century Scholars Program. Indeed, students in the Indiana initiative were nearly five times more likely than nonparticipants to enroll in college. The ACCESS Act creates a new incentive under the Leveraging Educational Assistance Partnership or LEAP program to spur states to form partnerships with colleges, businesses, and philanthropies to increase the amount of need-based grants. This new initiative would also make sure that students are aware of this opportunity for more aid in the 7th grade and provide early intervention, mentoring, and outreach services so they can stay on track for college. Again, research has shown that successful college access programs offer these components, and I am glad the bill before us includes them.

Furthermore, the Higher Education Amendments include several provisions from my PRREP--Preparing, Recruiting, and Retaining Education Professionals--Act, S. 1231, to strengthen the existing Teacher Quality Enhancement Grants program and improve college teacher preparation programs. These provisions ensure that prospective and beginning teachers, including for the first time, early childhood educators, have effective teaching skills, intensive, year-long pre-service clinical experiences, and high-quality, sustained multiyear mentoring and support in their first years of teaching. Too often, new teachers lack this kind of training and leave the profession. This bill aims to change that.

This legislation also includes my LIBRARIAN--Librarian Incentive to Boost Recruitment and Retention in Areas of Need--Act, S. 1121, to provide Perkins student loan forgiveness for full-time librarians with a master's degree in library science. Librarians working full-time in low-income areas would qualify for up to 100 percent Perkins student loan forgiveness depending on their number of years of experience. Indeed, a love of reading and books is essential to an educated workforce, but too often schools go without a trained librarian.

We hear often that serving in the military permits our military personnel to gain help with the costs of college when they leave the service, but all too often it is not enough. That is why I included language in this bill to increase Perkins loan forgiveness for members of the Armed Forces from 50 to 100 percent. The legislation also includes provisions I authored to create a career pathway for students with disabilities by providing training and support to middle school, high school, and university staff to encourage interest and understanding of educational and work-based opportunities for students, including those with disabilities, in disability-related fields.

I am also pleased this reauthorization bill includes provisions responding to recently uncovered conflicts of interests between lenders and college financial aid offices. This legislation provides students and families with increased disclosure about special arrangements between lenders and colleges and the terms and conditions of a school's ``preferred lender list''; prohibits payments, gifts, and other inducements from lenders to colleges and financial aid administrators; and requires colleges to establish and follow a student loan code of conduct.

The bill we are passing today is significant legislation that addresses one of the top concerns of American families. It tackles the twin goals of increased college access and affordability for students and their families as was intended when the Higher Education Act was created in 1965. It represents an important step in ensuring that every student with the drive and talent to go to college has the opportunity to do so. I thank Chairman Kennedy and Ranking Member Enzi, and their staffs, particularly Carmel Martin, J.D. LaRock, Missy Rohrbach, Erin Renner, and Emma Vadehra for their excellent work on this bill. I look forward to working with my colleagues to ensure that this important bill becomes law, so that we continue our commitment to creating and expanding educational opportunities for all students.

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