Congressional leaders unveiled on Thursday a spending bill for education and health that would give a big boost to the maximum Pell Grant and a $1-billion increase for biomedical research supported by the National Institutes of Health. President Bush has threatened a veto, but sponsors are working to attract enough votes in Congress to override him.
Under the bill, the maximum Pell Grant award would reach $4,925 in the 2008 fiscal year, up from the current $4,310. The jump is part of an effort by Congress's Democratic leaders to respond to spiraling college tuitions.
The budget of the NIH, the largest single source of funds for academic research, would hit an even $30-billion, the largest increase for the institutes in four years. The agency's budget increases have fallen below the rate of inflation in biomedical research since 2003, and the NIH's advocates say it is suffering as a result. The proposed increase for 2008 would also fall below projected inflation.
The $215.4-billion measure is a compromise version between bills approved earlier this year by the Senate and the House of Representatives. President Bush threatened a veto because both bills called for spending $10-billion more than he had proposed. (His proposal for the bill's education-and-health provisions represented a cut from totals enacted for 2007.)
In the compromise version, Democratic leaders tacked on a section to finance veterans programs in 2008, daring Mr. Bush to veto an overall package that would support a variety of programs with broad political appeal.
Democratic leaders dropped an earlier plan to marry this package with yet another appropriations bill to finance the Defense Department, after it appeared that liberal members of their own party would vote against it, because it contained money to pay for the war in Iraq. The revised strategy still faces opposition from Republicans in both chambers.
The 2008 fiscal year began in October, but Congress has yet to approve any of the 12 annual spending bills that together finance the federal government. For now, lawmakers have approved only a temporary measure, which expires this month, that finances federal programs at 2007 levels.
Selected Increases for Student Aid
The compromise spending bill for education and health offers no increase for most federal student-aid programs in 2008, with three exceptions. The TRIO programs for disadvantaged students would increase by 4.8-percent, to $868.2-million. The Gear Up program, which helps poor middle-school students prepare for college, would get an increase of 5 percent, to $318-million.
As for the increase for the maximum Pell award, the bill's language sets a maximum of $4,435. But the actual maximum would reach $4,925 because of additional amounts provided by separate legislation approved this year that reworked the program's financing (The Chronicle, September 10). The combined effect would be the largest increase in the maximum award in years.
Among other provisions affecting higher education, the bill would:
- Cut deeply into funds for the Reading First program, which would get $400-million, down from about $1-billion this year. The program provides grants to improve reading instruction at low-income schools in kindergarten through third grade. Legislators this year criticized the program, in part because of alleged conflicts of interest among university researchers it financed (The Chronicle, April 23).
- Require free access to scientific papers published by NIH-financed researchers no later than 12 months after their publication. The proposal is opposed by journal editors but supported by researchers who have argued that journal subscriptions are prohibitively costly (The Chronicle, January 26).
- Slice money for the Teacher Quality Grants program, which gives colleges of education money to improve their training of elementary- and secondary-school teachers. The program would get $34.3-million, down from $59.9-million this year.
- Raise spending for programs to train nurses and other health professionals, which President Bush had proposed to cut. The nursing program would get $167.7-million in 2008, a 12-percent increase.
- Support new programs run by the Department of Education to train more schoolteachers in the natural sciences and mathematics. The programs would receive $5-million, a fraction of the $276-million authorized by the America Competes Act, enacted this summer to enhance America's global economic competitiveness ( The Chronicle, August 10).
Congressional leaders did not make public on Thursday the text of the compromise bill. The Chronicle obtained details from higher-education advocates and Congressional staff members.
