Public Policy

One of the reasons the NASPA National Office is located in Washington D.C. is to ensure it can play an active role in shaping the legislation that directly impacts our day to day work. Recently, NASPA was asked to sign a letter to all the U.S. Senators encouraging them to support the educational provisions, including the delivery of urgently needed resources to the Pell Grant Program for low and middle income families, contained in H.R. 4872. On behalf of Region IV-West, I expressed my support for NASPA signing this letter.

The letter from Molly Corbett Broad, President of the American Council on Education, states in part:

“Passage of these provisions will help provide students with the resources they need to pursue postsecondary education. Without the funds made available by this legislation, 8 million low- and middle-income students who rely on Pell Grants could see their grants cut to maximum award levels last seen in the late 1980s. Others could see their grants disappear entirely. It is customary in periods of economic downturn for more students to turn to postsecondary education to acquire the skills they need to succeed in a competitive job market, and this trend is more pronounced now than at any other time in history. While this action by individuals ultimately contributes to economic recovery, it temporarily puts severe pressure on the Pell Grant Program.

We are pleased the bill also invests $2.6 billion in Historically Black Colleges and Universities, Hispanic-Serving Institutions, and Tribal Colleges and Universities to provide students at these institutions with the support they need to pursue and complete postsecondary education. Another important feature of the bill is the $2 billion that is made available to fund the Community College and Career Training Grant Program. Authorized in the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act, this program will provide competitive grants to local colleges to assist dislocated or unemployed workers or workers needing additional career training and education. These investments in students, workers and institutions will allow us to build our economy on the strength of a highly-skilled workforce. Finally, we appreciate the funding that is made available to assist schools with their conversion to direct lending under challenging time constraints.”

NASPA does what it can to keep us as informed as possible around National Public Policy issues, and the information (in addition to more details on the letter referenced above) can be found at http://www.naspa.org/divctr/pp/default.cfm. W e have lots of things going on in our individual states related to funding and policy issues that impact our colleges/universities every day that can quickly carry over to adjoining states. For example, the House of Representatives in Kansas recently passed concealed carry legislation that would allow firearms on campus.

Recently, Dr. Lois Flagstad, Vice President for Student Life at Black Hills State University, accepted the appointment for Region IV-West as the Public Policy Division Chair. As issues arise in your states, it is my hope you can communicate those to myself or Dr. Flagstad in order to ensure that they get on the radar for the rest of the region. We are in the process of creating a “Friends of Public Policy” listserv for the region, but, in the meantime, if you could send any updates to me at ivwestrvp@gmail.com or to Lois at Lois.Flagstad@bhsu.edu, it would be appreciated.

As always, let me know if you have questions or just want to get involved. I hope you enjoy the spring weather that has finally seemed to hit Kansas City.

Eric