E-Update for the Week of March 8, 2021

Highlights:

• On March 6, the Senate adopted an amended version of H.R.1319, the “American Rescue Plan Act.” The Senate adopted the bill on a 50-49 party line vote.
• On March 3, the Senate Finance Committee was tied with a 14-14 vote to report the nomination of Xavier Becerra to serve as Secretary of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) out of Committee. Senate Finance Committee Republican Members unanimously opposed the nomination.
• On March 1, the Senate confirmed Dr. Miguel Cardona as Secretary of the U.S. Department of Education (USED).

Biden Administration:

Nominations:

With tied vote, Senate Finance Committee moves forward Becerra nomination: The Senate Finance Committee held a full Committee hearing to report on the nomination of Xavier Becerra to serve as Secretary of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS). The Committee was tied with a 14-14 vote to report the nomination out of Committee. Senate Finance Committee Republican Members unanimously opposed the nomination. Under the rules of the Senate, notice of the tied vote will be transmitted to the Secretary of the Senate, thereby giving either the Senate Majority Leader or Senate Minority Leader the authority to make a motion to discharge the nomination. A discharge motion in the Senate is limited to four hours of debate and requires approval by the full Senate. It is unclear when the full Senate may consider a discharge motion relating to Becerra’s nomination.  Remarks from Senate Finance Committee Chairman Ron Wyden (D-OR) is here. A recording of the hearing is here.
March 3, 2021

Tanden withdraws nomination, replacement not yet named: Neera Tanden, President Biden’s nominee to serve as Director of the Office of Management and Budget (OMB), withdrew her nomination. The White House published a statement by President Biden in which he stated he accepted Tanden’s request to withdraw. The president went further to state that, “I look forward to having her serve in a role in my Administration,” but that role has not yet been announced. The full statement and letter from Tanden are here.

Relatedly, Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi (D-CA), House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer (D-MD), and House Majority Whip Jim Clyburn (D-SC) issued a joint statement urging Shalanda Young – who is the current nominee to serve as Deputy Director of OMB – to be nominated to replace Tanden. The full statement is here.
March 2 & 3, 2021

Cardona confirmed as next USED Secretary: The Senate confirmed Dr. Miguel Cardona as Secretary of the U.S. Department of Education (USED). Cardona was confirmed on a 64-33 bipartisan vote. Following his confirmation, Senate Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions (HELP) Committee Chairwoman Patty Murray (D-WA) issued a statement noting that, “Dr. Cardona would come to the Department as a proven leader who will work with students, parents, and caregivers, educators, school administrators, and state, local, and Tribal officials. And just as importantly, he would come to the Department as a former elementary school teacher, adjunct professor, principal, assistant superintendent, and former English learner himself, who knows that we have a responsibility to make sure every single student has access to a high-quality public education.” Additionally, Dr. Cardona received the support of fourteen Senate Republicans, including Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY) and Senate HELP Committee Ranking Member Richard Burr (R-NC). A statement by Senate Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions (HELP) Committee Chairwoman Patty Murray (D-WA) is here. A statement by Ranking Member Richard Burr (R-NC) is here. A statement from House Education and Labor Committee Ranking Member Virginia Foxx (R-NC) is here.
March 1, 2021

Personnel:

Mark Brown, head of FSA, resigns: USED Secretary Cardona released a statement following the resignation of Federal Student Aid (FSA) Chief Operating Officer Gen. Mark Brown. Brown was appointed to the role by former USED Secretary Betsy DeVos for a three-year term that had been set to end in March 2022. In his statement, Secretary Cardona said that he accepted Brown’s resignation and thanked him for his service to the Department. Secretary Cardona also said that the office would “renew its focus on streamlining access to and management of federal financial aid, easing the burden of student debt, and carefully stewarding taxpayer dollars.” Robin Minor will serve as acting Chief Operating Officer. The full statement is here.
March 5, 2021

White DPC announces additional education, racial and economic justice appointees: The White House announced additional appointments within the Domestic Policy Council (DPC). Maureen Tracey-Mooney will serve as Special Assistant to the President for Education. Tracey-Mooney previously served as Deputy Domestic Policy Advisor for President Biden when he served as vice president in the Obama Administration. Additionally, Donald Sherman will serve as Special Assistant to the President for Racial and Economic Justice. Sherman previously served as Deputy Director of Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics. The White House announcement is here.
March 5, 2021

Budget and Appropriations:

Senate adopts amended $1.9 relief package, House expected to consider the bill Tuesday:  Senate adopted an amended version of H.R.1319, the “American Rescue Plan Act.” The Senate adopted the bill on a 50-49 party line vote. The $1.9 trillion package, which is in line with President Biden’s coronavirus relief proposal of the same name, provides $130 billion in relief funding for elementary and secondary schools, $40 billion for higher education, and $40 billion for early childhood education. This package was developed based on reconciliation instructions included in the recently passed budget resolution; therefore, this broader reconciliation bill will only require a simple majority for passage rather than the typical 60-vote threshold in the Senate. Previously, the House adopted its own version of the bill, but the Senate version is largely similar to the House-passed version, with few changes. The House will now need to pass the amended Senate version before sending the bill to the President for signature. According to a statement by House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer (D-MD), the House could consider the bill as early as Tuesday. A summary of the bill prepared by the Senate Budget Committee is here. The text of the bill, prior to any final amendments, is here.

A key change from the House-passed version is that the Senate package would newly require states to set-aside not less than 1% of their funding for summer enrichment programs, not less than 1% of their funding for afterschool programs, and 2.5% of their funding for educational technology. This is in addition to a set-aside of not less than 5% of state funding to address learning loss included in the House-passed version and maintained in the Senate package. Additionally, the Senate package set-aside $2.75 billion of the funding for K-12 schools for services or assistance to non-public schools that enroll a significant percentage of low-income students and are most impacted by the pandemic. The Senate package also includes a new provision to prevent student loan forgiveness over the next five years from resulting in a tax bill for borrowers.
March 6, 2021

Coronavirus Updates (as related to education):

Administration:

White House:

Biden announces that teachers, school staff, child care providers will receive vaccine priority: President Joe Biden delivered remarks related to the Administration’s efforts to expand vaccine capacity for American adults on March 2. During his remarks, the president stated that he is “directing every state” to prioritize educators for vaccinations. He continued, “Let me be clear: We can reopen schools if the right steps are taken, even before employees are vaccinated. But time and again, we’ve heard from educators and parents that they have anxieties about that.” Additionally, the president noted that in-person learning should be treated like an essential service and urged states to vaccinate educators, school staff, and child care workers “immediately.” The president went further to challenge states to provide at least one shot for every educator, school staff member, and child care worker by the end of March. To support this, the president stated that the Administration will be using the federal pharmacy program to prioritize vaccination of pre-K through 12 educators, staff, and child care workers.  The president’s full remarks are here.
March 2, 2021

U.S. Department of Education (USED):

Cardona outlines five-point plan for safe school reopening: USA Today published an Op-ed authored by USED Secretary Miguel Cardona titled, “Here is my five-point plan to get students back in school full time.” In the article, Secretary Cardona outlines his plan to leverage the Department in supporting the safe reopening of schools. Secretary Cardona describes that he will convene a national summit on safe reopening, which will consist of students, teachers, families, community organizations, and school leaders; create a “best practices clearinghouse” to share best practices on school reopening; publish a second volume of the Department’s COVID-19 handbook; and collect data on school openings and operations. The Secretary also urged the passage of the American Rescue Plan, which would provide $1.9 trillion in additional coronavirus relief funding, including financial resources for schools to operate safely and fully. The full article is here.
March 2, 2021

Non-Coronavirus Updates:

Administration:

U.S. Department of Education (USED):

NACIQI votes to recommend ACICS be terminated from federal accreditation: The National Advisory Committee on Institutional Quality and Integrity (NACIQI) voted to recommend to USED that ACICS’s [Accrediting Council for Independent Colleges and Schools] recognition be terminated on the grounds that ACICS does not comply with federal standards for accreditors. As background, the recognition of ACICS, which is an accreditor of for-profit colleges, was terminated by the Obama Administration, but was reinstated by the Trump Administration. The Biden Administration must now make a decision regarding the recognition of ACICS. Politico article is here (subscription required).

The recommendation to terminate recognition of ACICS comes as the USED Office of Inspector General (OIG) released a report on March 2 concluding that the Department’s process for assessing ACICS’s compliance with federal regulatory criteria for recognition, under the leadership of former USED Secretary Betsy DeVos, “followed applicable policies and regulations.” In the report, the OIG instead found that the Department did not comply with all regulatory requirements during its review of ACICS’s petition for recognition renewal in 2016 faulting the Obama Administration for the process it used to previously terminate ACICS. The full report is here.
March 5, 2021

Upcoming Events (Congressional and Administration):

• On March 9 at 10:00 am, the Senate Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions (HELP) Committee will hold a full Committee hearing titled, “Examining Our COVID-19 Response: An Update from the Frontlines.” The hearing will feature testimony from Dr. Jerry Abraham, Director of Kedren Health Vaccines; Dr. Umair Shah, Secretary of Health of the state of Washington; Dr. Ashish Jha, Dean of the Brown University School of Public Health; and Dr. Mary Ann Fuchs, Vice President and Chief Nurse Executive of the Duke University Health System. More information will be posted here.
• On March 11 at 10:30 am, the House Energy and Commerce Consumer Protection and Commerce Subcommittee will hold a subcommittee hearing titled, “Kids Online During COVID: Child Safety in an Increasingly Digital Age.” Witnesses have not yet been announced. More information will be posted here.

Upcoming Events (Outside Organizations):

• On March 9 at 3:00 pm, FutureEd, Education Resource Strategies (ERS), and EducationCounsel will hold an event titled, “Innovations in Teaching During the Pandemic.” The webinar will discuss how schools and districts have embraced innovative staffing and scheduling strategies in response to the pandemic, which have also led to more instructional support for teachers. More information and registration are here.
• On March 10 at 1:00 pm, the Progressive Policy Institute (PPI) will hold an event titled, “Creating Opportunity for All with Early-College High Schools.” The webinar will discuss the impact and significance of high schools that provide students with dual-enrollment opportunities. More information and registration are here.
• On March 11 at 3:00 pm, the American Enterprise Institute (AEI) will hold an event titled, “A search for common ground: Conversations about the toughest questions in K-12 education.” The pre-recorded event will feature a conversation between Rick Hess and Pedra Noguera as they discuss the ideological differences within K-12 education policy. Policies explored will include school choice, for-profit provision, civics, and anti-racism. More information and registration are here.
• On March 16 at 3:00 pm, the Brookings Institute will hold an event titled, “How the COVID-19 pandemic has impacted higher education.” The webinar to discuss how institutions of higher education have been impacted by the pandemic and what it may mean for the future of higher education. Specifically, the webinar will discuss decreases in enrollment rates, the potential rise of for-profit institutions, and how institutions are engaging students during the pandemic. More information and registration are here.

Publications (Outside Organizations):

• On March 3, Third Way published a report titled, “Paying More for Less? A New Classification System to Prioritize Outcomes in Higher Education.” The report looks at how the higher education sector fared following the Great Recession and proposes a new classification system for measuring college students’ return on investment (ROI) while seeking to inform targeted policies designed to protect students with the greatest need for support in response to the COVID-19 pandemic. Key findings of the report include that underserved students enrolled disproportionately at for-profit institutions following the Great Recession and received a poor return on their educational investment after doing so; that for-profit institutions account for roughly 40 percent of all spending on higher education advertising despite enrolling only about 6 percent of college students; and that future policy conversations on how to prioritize ROI and protect underserved students in higher education should be focused on transparency and accountability. The full report is here.
• On March 1, FutureEd published a report titled, “Tough Test: The Nation’s Troubled Early Learning Assessment Landscape.” The report explores the current patchwork system of early learning assessments that makes it challenging to effectively target resources, ensure that disadvantaged students get the early support they need, and improve programs and teaching. Key recommendations in the report include developing an evidence-based curricula by experts with a specific scope and sequence; tracking a representative sample of children at the state or district level to measure progress and inform instruction (rather than tracking at the system level); providing federal funding for competitive grant opportunities that bring together researchers and practitioners to determine which early learning skills best predict school success. The full report is here.
• On February 25, the Brookings Institution published a report titled, “Student Debt Cancellation Should Consider Wealth, Not Income.” The report explores the effects of cancelling debt at various levels of intervention: up to $10,000 cancelled for all; up to $50,000 cancelled based on means-testing for households earning under $100,000 and a sliding scale cancellation for households earning up to $250,000; and total debt cancellation. Key findings of the report include that student debt disproportionately harms wealth-poor households and, in particular, wealth-poor Black households; that, as a result, income is not necessarily an accurate metric to measure the extent of the student debt crisis for Black Americans; and that wealth disparities created by anti-Black policies of the past must be considered when exploring debt cancellation policies. The full report is here.

Legislation:

H.R.1498
A bill to require that local educational agencies disclose negotiations with teacher unions as a condition for eligibility to receive funds under the Elementary and Secondary School Emergency Relief Fund of the Education Stabilization Fund of the Coronavirus Response and Relief Supplemental Appropriations Act, 2021.
Sponsor: Rep. Bob Good (R-VA)

H.R.1509
A bill to repeal portions of a regulation issued by the State Superintendent of Education of the District of Columbia that require child care workers to have a degree, a certificate, or a minimum number of credit hours from an institution of higher education.
Sponsor: Rep. Nancy Mace (R-SC)

H.R.1521
A bill to amend the Higher Education Act of 1965 to support innovative, evidence-based approaches that improve the effectiveness and efficiency of postsecondary education for all students, to allow pay for success initiatives, to provide additional evaluation authority, and for other purposes.
Sponsor: Rep. Mikie Sherrill (D-NJ)

H.R.1536
A bill to amend the Higher Education Act of 1965 to include all members of the Armed Forces in the definition of “independent student” for purposes of determining the eligibility of such members for Federal financial assistance, and for other purposes.
Sponsor: Rep. Guy Reschenthaler (R-PA)

H.R.1547
A bill to improve the financial literacy of secondary school students.
Sponsor: Rep. Matt Cartwright (D-PA)

H.R.1566
A bill to amend the Child Abuse Prevention and Treatment Act to require that equitable distribution of assistance include equitable distribution to Indian tribes and tribal organizations and to increase amounts reserved for allotment to Indian tribes and tribal organizations under certain circumstances, and to provide for a Government Accountability Office report on child abuse and neglect in American Indian tribal communities.
Sponsor: Rep. Raul Grijalva (D-AZ)

H.R.1586
A bill to amend the Higher Education Act of 1965 to direct the Secretary of Education to carry out a program under which an institution of higher education may elect to cosign Federal student loans made to students attending the institution, and for other purposes.
Sponsor: Rep. Scott Perry (R-PA)

S.518
A bill to amend the Higher Education Act of 1965 to support innovative, evidence-based approaches that improve the effectiveness and efficiency of postsecondary education for all students, to allow pay for success initiatives, to provide additional evaluation authority, and for other purposes.
Sponsor: Senator Todd Young (R-IN)

S.538
A bill to repeal portions of a regulation issued by the State Superintendent of Education of the District of Columbia that require child care workers to have a degree, a certificate, or a minimum number of credit hours from an institution of higher education.
Sponsor: Senator Mike Lee (R-UT)

S.603
A bill to amend the Higher Education Act of 1965 to provide for the refinancing of certain Federal student loans, and for other purposes.
Sponsor: Senator Mark Warner (D-VA)