Important news in higher ed: Federal Pell grants may soon cover summer school
By: Katherine Long
Seattle Times
New bipartisan legislation would allow students who get federal financial aid for college to use the grants for summer school, which could help them finish a college degree faster.
A bill to allow students to get federal Pell Grants for summer school passed through the Senate’s appropriations committee last week. It was supported Washington’s Sen. Patty Murray, the top Democrat on the Senate Labor, Health, and Human Services Appropriations Subcommittee, and Lamar Alexander, R-Tenn., the Senate education committee chairman.
Murray said she was only able to go to college herself because of federal financial aid. If the bill passes, Alexander said, it “would be the most important news in higher education so far this year.”
About 15,000 students in Washington, and 1 million students nationwide, use Pell Grants to help pay for their college educations. However, a student who enrolls full-time for two semesters in a row is not eligible for more Pell money, for that academic year, at the end of the second semester. The new legislation would allow students to receive Pell Grant money for the summer semester as well.
The bill now goes to the full Senate, although a date for a vote has not yet been set, and must also pass the House. House Speaker Paul Ryan, R-Wisconsin, has signaled he would support a summer Pell program. If approved, Pell Grants would become available year-round beginning in 2017-18.
For a brief time, Congress experimented with offering year-round Pell Grants, but ended the program in 2011, citing the cost. It’s estimated that restoring year-round Pell Grants would provide an estimated one million students with an additional $1,650, on average, in 2017-18.
