5 Ways a Democratic U.S. House Changes the Playing Field for Higher Education

By JEFFREY BRAINARD, STEPHEN BURD, and KELLY FIELD

Related materials

Article: Democrats Gain Control of House, but Senate Remains in Doubt

Article tools

Printer friendly	E-mail article	Subscribe	Order reprints
	Discuss any Chronicle article in our forums
Latest Headlines Universities Must Disclose More Data on Animal Research A court settlement requires the U.S. Department of Agriculture to make public more information about research on animals, prompting some academic researchers to worry about further attacks by animal-rights extremists. 2-Year Colleges Streamline Student Aid and Focus on Counseling For Provost Who Fled Lebanon, U. of Dayton Is His 'Village' Letters Home From World War II Soldiers Are Found in College Basement

News Headlines From The Chronicle

Democrats gain control of U.S. House, but Senate remains in doubt

5 ways a Democratic U.S. House changes the playing field for higher education

Michigan voters adopt ban on racial and gender preferences

Spending limits are defeated in 3 states, but Missouri's stem-cell vote is close

Results of state referenda related to higher education



Besides making college more affordable, training more scientists and engineers, and expanding federal financing of stem-cell research (see article), here are some other higher-education issues to watch now that the Democrats have gained control of the U.S. House of Representatives:

The Higher Education Act

The reauthorization of the Higher Education Act, which has languished in Congress for years, is expected to take a back seat to the renewal of the No Child Left Behind Act, which is much more controversial among Democrats.

Rep. George Miller, of California, is widely expected to take over the House Committee on Education and the Workforce. Leadership of that panel's subcommittee on higher education, however, is up for grabs. Rep. Dale E. Kildee, of Michigan, appears to be out of the running. He said at a recent meeting of the Committee for Education Funding, a nonprofit coalition of education groups, that he wanted to head the panel that drafts the bill to reauthorize the No Child Left Behind Act. Some lobbyists are worried that the alternative choice would be Rep. Robert E. Andrews, of New Jersey, who is considered a strong supporter of for-profit institutions and lenders. Another alternative is Rep. Lynn C. Woolsey, of California.

Academic Earmarks

Rep. David R. Obey, of Wisconsin, is likely to become chairman of the full House Committee on Appropriations. He has been among the most fiery critics of the Republicans' spending priorities, often complaining that they have neglected federal funds for college students and biomedical research as well as for schools and other social programs. Congressman Obey has also vocally objected to the stratospheric rise in recent years of Congressional earmarks, the noncompetitive grants secured by lawmakers for colleges and other favored constituents. Mr. Obey has suggested that Congress curtail, but not abolish, the practice.

Perhaps more important, though, the Democratic victory will provide more influence for one of the House's most-ardent supporters of earmarks, Rep. John P. Murtha, of Pennsylvania. Congressman Murtha plans to run for majority leader, and he is renowned for his prowess in securing earmarks for his own constituents and for allies in both parties. So any steep decline in federal earmarks for academe appears unlikely.

Support for Academic Research

Democratic control may bring some changes in Congressional policy on scientific research and training, including larger increases in federal spending for university research than recent years have seen. Earlier this year, some incumbent Democratic House members called for a bigger budget for the National Institutes of Health than that supported by their Republican colleagues and President Bush. Appropriations for the biomedical-research agency, the largest source of funds for academic research, have fallen for the past four years after adjustment for inflation.

Student Loans

Companies in the federal guaranteed-student-loan program fear that they will pay for tying their fortunes so closely to the Republican Party (The Chronicle, November 7). The student-loan industry as a whole has overwhelmingly directed its campaign contributions to Republicans. A special report by The Chronicle found that loan-industry officials had donated $632,000 during the first 18 months of the 2003-4 election cycle to the 49 representatives of the House Committee on Education and the Workforce, which is in charge of drafting higher-education legislation, with close to 80 percent of that total going to the panel's Republican members. Democrats are very likely to propose slashing subsidies to lenders to pay for the party's top campaign pledge: cutting in half the interest rate students pay on their federal student loans.

In addition, Democratic lawmakers are expected to significantly expand Congressional oversight over the guaranteed-student-loan program, investigating, for example, whether some loan companies have violated a provision of the Higher Education Act barring lenders from offering inducements to colleges "to secure applicants" for federal loans.

For-Profit Colleges

Nobody was more disappointed that Congress failed to reauthorize the Higher Education Act over the last few years than advocates for for-profit colleges. Now their efforts to get Congress to relax rules that proprietary institutions must follow to participate in the federal student-aid programs are likely to fail. Those rules were imposed by measures that were added to the law in the 1990s, as a way to curb the growth of fly-by-night trade schools that were offering students federal aid but giving them no real education, leaving them with huge debts and worthless degrees. Republican leaders of the House education committee had sought to ease those restrictions in their version of legislation to renew the law.

Now, Democrats will get the chance to rewrite the reauthorization bill and will probably remove provisions the Republicans included. Among those are provisions that would broaden the federal government's definition of "an institution of higher education" to include for-profit colleges and soften provisions in the "90-10 rule," which requires for-profit colleges to receive at least 10 percent of their revenue each year from sources other than federal student aid.