U.S. DEPARTMENT OF EDUCATION 

OFFICE OF POSTSECONDARY EDUCATION 

PUBLIC REGIONAL HEARING ON 

NEGOTIATED RULEMAKING 

Thursday, October 2, 2008 

9:00 a.m. – 4:00 p.m. 

Smothers Theater 

Pepperdine University 

Malibu, California

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P R O C E E D I N G S

MR. BERGERON: --when they will interpret during the proceedings. 

Otherwise, they will be here until we hear that someone has that 

particular need. With that, I am going to go ahead and ask if Andy 

Benton could come and say a few words. 

MR. BENTON: Just a word of welcome. We are delighted that 

Pepperdine was selected as a venue for one of these hearings, and we 

welcome you to Malibu. One of my predecessors, Norvel Young, would 

describe our campus by saying we have 830 acres in Malibu, smog-free, 

sun-kissed, ocean-washed, island-girded, and mountain-guarded. I was 

never so clever, but I always thought that Norvel had it just about 

right. If you'd like coffee while you're here today, you can go outside 

this building and around the corner to a building we call "The HAWC," 

the Howard A. White Center. They also have snacks. And then, when it 

comes time for lunch, you're very welcome to go to our cafeteria, which 

is--you have to go around the construction to the Tyler Campus Center, 

and our cafeteria is really quite good. We don't get very many 

complaints, which, on a college campus is pretty unusual not to have 

complaints about cafeteria food. We're delighted to be a part of the 

government process. We believe in that, and we're grateful that we do 

have a Higher Education Act to be discussing, and now to participate in 

the process of framing the regulations. 

Welcome to our campus. I hope it's a productive day. Thank you. 

MR. BERGERON: Thank you, Dr. Benton. want to thank you for making 

your campus available. We have thoroughly enjoyed our time having 

arrived here yesterday evening on the campus, and we look forward to 

spending more time with you and your staff. You know, we appreciate all 

the support we've gotten from everybody here. So, thank you. 

With that, I will invite either Danny or Harold to say a few 

words, or we will get started. 

MR. MADZELAN: Ditto. Again, welcome, everyone, and thanks for 

having us here. We look forward to hearing your suggestions, your 

comments, your concerns about this reauthorization legislation in the 

manner in which we in the Education Department in cooperation and 

2 
consultation with you folks in the field implement these new provisions 

through our regulatory process. Thank you. 

MR. JENKINS: I would just add a little bit about the structure of 

what we're doing. Congress has enacted a statute which, in many 

respects breaks new ground, but in many other respects, it amends 

programs that have existed for a long time. And what we're doing here 

is to implement regulations to administer the statutes that Congress 

has enacted. So, in other words, we're kind of filling in the gaps that 

they left when they enacted the statute. 

And the regulations--the negotiated rulemaking process relates 

only to certain programs in the statute. So, that's primarily what 

we're here to listen to your comments about. These include primarily 

the Title IV programs, and especially the student financial aid 

programs. That's about it. 

MR. BERGERON: Our first person who is testifying is Joy Brittain. 

If you could indicate, when you speak for the record, your name 

and the organization you are representing, that would be great. Thank 

you, Joy. 

MS. BRITTAIN: Good morning, and welcome to the West Coast. 

My name is Joy Brittain, and I direct an Upward Bound Math 

Science program, which is part of TRIO. I'm also representing as past 

President of the Western Association of Educational Opportunity 

Personnel, one of the ten regions part of the Department of Education 

that comes together through the national organization, the Council for 

Opportunity in Education, and I just have three small items. 

The first one comes to Talent Search, one of the TRIO Programs. 

In the HEOA--and it includes several changes in the Talent Search. The 

legislation modifies and expands its purpose, including college 

completion, whether students pursued a rigorous program of study in 

high school, received their high school diploma on time, and it also 

now includes required services section, specifying that projects must 

provide students with high-quality academic tutoring services, proper 

guidance in secondary and postsecondary course completion, assistance 

in completing college entrance exams, and admission of financial aid 

applications. This is a dramatic change, a dramatic change, from Talent 

Search, from where it came from being pretty much a dissemination 

program. And in order to achieve these goals, it will need to increase 

its intensity, and also the services within this area. 

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And so, representing TRIO, we urge the Department of Education to 

reduce the number of participants from 600 to a lower number. In order 

for TRIO to really assume these responsibilities, having 600 students 

would be an impossibility. And this would allow Talent Search projects 

to provide more targeted services in a more consistent basis. 

And although funding is more dealing with appropriations than 

what you are here to hear, we do encourage the Department to increase 

the cost per student in order that the Talent Search projects can meet 

its objectives. The second program that I like to talk about is the 

Student Support Services. It is our understanding that the Department 

of Education is considering a plan to delay the Student Support 

Services competition, and while under the Section 403(a)1(B), from the 

HEOA, the Department has given authority to provide a one-time limited 

extension to synchronize the awarding of grants, we ask that this 

extension be limited to one year. And the reason why we're asking this 

is that this will provide the time necessary to get the law and the 

regulations in sync so that we are all on the same page. It also allows 

sufficient time for the Student Support Services programs, both those 

seeking a renewal grant and those writing for the first time, to be 

prepared to submit an application consistent with the new laws and 

regulations. We believe that this would be a win-win situation for both 

the TRIO community and the Department of Education. And then, the last 

item has to do with the annual performance reports. For the first time, 

Congress defined prior experience by prescribing outcome criteria for 

those TRIO Programs--for all TRIO Programs. And in addition, just as in 

the case mentioned earlier regarding Talent Search, Congress included 

new required services provisions and amended previously existing 

permissible services within the TRIO Programs. 

In order for these changes to occur in the current TRIO projects 

and to complete the APRs, which is a necessity for all TRIO Programs--

in a timely manner--we strongly encourage the Department to update the 

materials as soon as available, and to disburse them--and disburse this 

information to all of the TRIO community as soon as possible. We want 

to adhere to what has been defined, and what will be considered 

renewable and considered amended through the negotiated rulemaking, and 

we want to make the best efforts to bring that information to the 

Department. 

 Thank you. 

4 
MR. BERGERON: Thank you, Joy. 

We're going to hold off just a minute...see our transcriber is in 

the room, so let me just see how long it will take him to get set up. 

So, we're just going to--just hold just a minute. Thank you. 

[Pause.] 

MR. BERGERON: So, I've been told the recording--they were 

recording and it started before we got to this point, so that we can go 

ahead and continue, and he'll just get the tape in order for them to 

get the complete record. So, we'll go ahead and have Jeff Ross come and 

join us. Again, introduce yourself by saying what organization you're 

representing. Good morning. 

 MR. ROSS: Yes. My name is Jeff Ross, and I'm with Taft Community 

College in California, and I would like to thank you for the 

opportunity to comment on the Higher Education Opportunity Act, but 

most specifically, those sections that deal with individuals with 

intellectual disabilities. 

I am the Director of Student Support Services at Taft College, 

and I'm also the founder of the Transition to Independent Living 

Program, which is a residential program for individuals with the 

developmental disabilities who learn vocational and life skills while 

living on our college dormitories and off-campus housing. 

Our students access the entire campus socially, and are 

integrated in traditional classes with supports if they demonstrate a 

desire and meet entrance requirements that are established by the 

institution. The program was established in 1995, and we have currently 

48 students enrolled, a three-year waiting list, and an additional 200 

applications that are waiting to be processed. We have 162 graduates 

from the program with a Taft College Certificate of Completion, and 98 

percent of these students live independently, and 95 percent of those 

individuals are competitively employed. I am also a cofounder of the 

California Consortium for Postsecondary Options for Individuals with 

Developmental Disabilities, which is quite a title--which is quite a 

title, but anyway, it's kind of descriptive. This consortium is 

composed of professionals from California community colleges, 

California state universities, University of California, K-12 

transition programs, Department of Developmental Services, regional 

centers, Department of Rehabilitation, State Council on Developmental 

Disabilities, parents, and, most importantly, students with 

5 
intellectual disabilities. This organization disseminates information 

regarding postsecondary options, works in the policy arena, and 

provides technical assistance to existing postsecondary programs, and 

those institutions that are interested in starting new programs. My 

professional experience speaks to my passion for the establishment of 

postsecondary programs throughout the Nation, and I work very 

diligently in the halls of Congress to get this amendment passed, that 

deals with intellectual disabilities. My experience, which is 32 years 

in the field, leads me to comment on a few of the sections that 

actually made it through the bill. First of all, regarding definition 

of students with intellectual disabilities, this requires that students 

with intellectual disabilities to participate on not less than a halftime basis as determined by the institution, with such participation 

focusing on academic components. 

Now, as these students are actually moving into a postsecondary 

arena, we really think that the Department really needs to give us some 

flexible guidelines, but some real, true guidelines, on what exactly is 

a half-time student. We think that--we need to know if this is--if this 

determination is done solely by the program. We want to know if the 

academic Senate has involvement in this determination. We want to know 

the implications on what happens with accreditation standards when it 

comes to determining half-time students--half-time status for these 

individuals, or is this just merely an administrative statement? 

One of the other components just on the definitions, also, is 

that it requires--in regular enrollment in credit-bearing courses with 

non-disabled students offered by the institution, auditing or 

participating in courses with non-disabled students offered by the 

institution, of which the student does not receive regular academic 

credit, enrollment in noncredit-bearing, non-degree courses with nondisabled students, and participation in internship or work-based 

training in settings with non-disabled students. The original versions, 

the House version and the Senate version, were actually more inclusive 

than what the final language actually came out to be. We feel that we 

need to have multiple models--for universities and, in particular, in 

my instance, community colleges--so that these students can access a 

curriculum, the entire curriculum, and not only be regulated to mainly 

an academic course. We feel that the mission of community colleges, 

which is a vocational mission and, indeed, that also recognizes the 

6 
academic mission, can be better served if the student has greater 

access to the curriculum. The next aspect, too--and regarding that, 

too--is, one of the things that I think that we need to be aware of, 

too, is that many community college campuses throughout the United 

States are open access colleges, where you do not have to have a high 

school diploma to enter these programs. So, right now, we actually do--

these students are already on our campuses. They are actually in 

inclusive environments, and are not doing so well. They are coming to 

us unprepared and, as an institution, we are being taxed with our 

disabled student programs and services because we are trying to provide 

accommodations for some of these programs where these students actually 

are not able to benefit. So, we think that we need to design programs 

that actually will--like the program we have at Taft--that actually can 

provide a real certificate, and these students can come out and become 

productive members of society. 

Well, the next aspect I would like to talk about is the National 

Technical Assistance Center, and--which is the coordinating center that 

is established by this legislation. I feel that the coordinating center 

is key to the establishment and implementation of new programs, and my 

experience with the California Consortium providing technical 

assistance to a number of postsecondary institutions brings me to this 

conclusion. We feel that the--or I feel that the competitive process 

needs to be extensive in that the community colleges, the state 

colleges and universities, as well as private colleges deserve equal 

consideration as candidates for this coordinating center, and that all 

geographic areas are represented. One could also argue for the creation 

of multiple centers throughout the country. 

I thank you for your time and your ear, and if I can assist the 

Department in any manner with the implementation, I would be honored. I 

believe this legislation is key to the unlocking [of] the college door 

for this population and, with proper implementation, this underserved 

student body will prosper. 

Thank you. 

MR. BERGERON: Thank you. 

Pat Hurley. 

DR. HURLEY: Good morning. 

I’m Dr. Patricia Hurley, Associate Dean for Financial Aid at 

Glendale Community College, and Vice President for Federal Relations 

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for the California Association of Student Financial Aid Administrators. 

CASFAA is the largest state financial aid association in the country, 

representing more than 1,700 financial aid administrators from over 500 

California postsecondary institutions. We extend you a warm welcome, 

warmer than normal, and thank you for selecting our state as one of 

your sites. 

The Higher Education Opportunity Act includes numerous new 

provisions requiring additional institutional reporting requirements, 

campus security reporting, institutional consumer information, and loan 

disclosure information. But as practicing aid administrators, our 

comments today are focused on some of the issues we will be facing in 

our own offices. Addressing the student eligibility issues on Part F 

for Title IV under parent information and loan eligibility, we feel 

that students whose parents--well, the law states that students whose 

parents who refuse to support them or complete a FAFSA form are now 

eligible for an unsubsidized student loan. It is our understanding that 

this section does not change the students' dependency status, but there 

is some confusion over this in the field, and we're requesting some 

clarification. If this doesn't rise to the level of regulation, then 

perhaps a "dear colleague" letter would help clear that up. 

With professional judgment issues, the law also offers additional 

examples of circumstances where an aid administrator may use 

professional judgment to assist a student. The law preserves our 

ability to use our own judgment to make need analysis judgments when 

warranted by mitigating circumstances and prescribes that a 

professional judgment decision be exercised on a documented case-bycase basis. We're concerned that this specificity in the law may lead 

some aid officers to believe that their authority is limited to the 

circumstances that are described in the law. So, we are asking the 

Department to reconfirm the broad application of professional judgment 

allowed under the law, and the principal that financial aid officers 

are the sole authority on whether a student's circumstances merit a 

professional judgment decision. 

The law also states that students who become ineligible due to 

prior drug convictions while receiving Title IV aid may become eligible 

for Title IV aid if they completed two unannounced drug tests. The 

Department agreed in prior negotiated rulemaking sessions that Title IV 

eligibility requirements concerning drug offenses should not be 

8 
determined by the institution, but left up to direct communication 

between the student and the Department. We request that this policy be 

continued, and that this new provision be incorporated into the current 

process. There were some sections on ACG Grant, and we support the 

reinstatement of the Department's authority to develop a set of courses 

that can serve as an alternative to the state's definition of rigorous 

high school curriculum, and believe that the current set of courses 

have worked well, and they provide us with a method of qualifying 

students in private high schools, where the curriculum may differ from 

the state-prescribed curriculum but be equally or more rigorous. 

Under the TEACH Grant, we applaud the law's provision that allows 

the Department to define extenuating circumstances under which the 

recipient may be excused from teaching the full four years without 

penalty of the grant being converted to a loan. We request that the 

Department establish regulations that are broad enough to include a 

variety of reasonable circumstances, and a process by which the 

recipient may appeal a negative decision on the part of the Secretary. 

California is one of the states that requires civil confinement--

and this is a new provision under the law--for previously incarcerated 

sexual offenders. The law now prohibits institutions from awarding Pell 

Grants to these individuals; however, it is unclear how institutions 

will obtain this information, and it is likely in a state as large as 

California, that it could be difficult for institutions to acquire this 

information despite their best efforts. We request that the Department 

develop a way to report this status on the ICER, if possible. Under 

Part B, we have been working with our sister organization, the 

California Community College Financial Aid Association for 

clarification that lenders and guarantors can assist institutions with 

in-person loan entrance and exit counseling. This became confused 

during other recent legislation and the regulation process. 

The law specifically exempts these activities in the definition 

of prohibited gifts, but in another section only specifies that 

guarantee agencies may assist institutions with exit counseling. It is 

our understanding that Congress intended to allow both lenders and 

guarantee agencies to assist colleges with loan entrance and exit 

counseling, but could only address the exit counseling issue, because 

entrance counseling is regulatory and not statutory. 

9 
There are many reasons why loan counseling delivered by the 

lender or the guarantee agency is very effective, not the least is the 

increasing complexity of the programs that make it difficult for aid 

officers to deliver the most updated and accurate information to 

students. We request that the Department specifically reaffirm this 

important role of lenders and guarantors in the upcoming regulations. 

We are also concerned about cohort default rates, and it is anticipated 

that the increase in the number of years over which the loan cohort 

default rate is calculated will increase the average cohort default 

rates for all institutions. 

Institutions may appeal an adverse ruling due to a high default 

rate and if they have a low number of student borrowers. This is 

because the law already recognizes that the default rate is not a 

measure of institutional integrity in these cases. However, to get to 

that point, the institution must submit a detailed appeal to the 

Department after the default rates are published. This seems to be an 

unnecessary clerical burden for both the institution that has to 

prepare the appeal, and the unit in the Department of Education charged 

with reviewing it. In addition, although the institution is then 

exempted, the adverse publicity generated by the published default rate 

can have a negative effect on the institution's enrollment. So, we are 

supporting the proposal from the California Community Colleges 

Financial Aid Administrators Association to provide an automatic 

exemption, and not require the calculation of a default rate for these 

institutions. And finally, the law speaks to some length about 

simplifying the application process and creating an easy FAFSA, and 

there are a number of provisions relating to simplifying the FAFSA 

form, including cutting the number of questions by 50 percent. 

And, considering the new criteria and eligibility items created 

in the law, we seriously question how that can be done and maintain the 

FAFSA's ability to do basic screening for students' Title IV 

eligibility. The Higher Education Opportunity Act also promotes 

creating an easier FAFSA. It is part of the simplifying the process. We 

believe that there are some students for which this approach is ideal, 

specifically, those eligible for and participating in programs like 

TANF, SSI, and other public service programs directed to documented 

low-income families or individuals. We are very concerned about the 

loopholes that a simplified form may create for other students and 

10 
families with more complicated financial situations. While we recognize 

all the inadequacies of the current system, we urge the Department to 

approach FAFSA revisions cautiously, and with sufficient testing to 

avoid creating more loopholes and unfairness into our already imperfect 

system. And we thank the Department for allowing us this opportunity to 

comment. Thank you. 

MR. BERGERON: We've got a couple of follow-up questions, I think, 

and I'll start by making a comment, or a--that the Secretary, I think, 

yesterday released a plan for vastly simplifying the FAFSA, and so, I 

commend it to your review. 

I think that the plan calls for using two financial data elements 

for awarding federal aid, and only two: the AGI and the exemptions 

claim to the tax return. So--and we have a further conversation at some 

point about how that might play out in practice for institutions, but I 

would commend it to your review, and we'll have some conversations, I'm 

sure, around that, after you've had a chance to review it. It was late 

last night. She was speaking at 6:00 East Coast time, so I don't know 

to the extent anybody's had time to really think about that. 

My question, though, is related to confusion around unsubsidized 

loan eligibility. And could you speak a little bit more about what 

that--how that confusion is playing out. We've heard some concerns and 

I just want to make sure that, as we develop some preliminary guidance, 

that we respond to the concerns that you have. 

DR. HURLEY: I think even though it's stated in the law, I think, 

some people are confused about whether this means you can--the student 

becomes independent, which they do not, but you're treating them like 

an independent student, because you're not requiring parents' 

information. So, how that happens becomes kind of confusing. And then, 

if there's confusion over whether they're dependent or independent, 

that follows through to whether then they qualify for an additional 

$2,000 unsubsidized or $6,000 unsubsidized on the additional loan 

amount. 

So, I think it just needs some clarification, because we're used 

to thinking of situations like that as being dependency override 

situations. And in this case, it really is not. 

MR. BERGERON: Right. And also, there is confusion or concerns 

about how you even get an application from a student in this 

circumstance, because, in general, we reject applications from--that 

11 
are received that don't provide--don't collect parents' financial 

information for dependent students, right? So it's-- 

 DR. HURLEY: Well, I think there's a whole lot of clarification 

on this. At what point does this parents' refusal to supply the 

information become a reason to not include it at all? That kind of goes 

against our forever, longstanding philosophy that it's the parents' 

responsibility, and no matter what, they're--unless there are really 

mitigating, tenuous circumstances, parents are required to provide that 

information. So, I think it's--there will be a lot of confusion about 

this particular issue. Once families find out about it, the question 

is, are they--is it a real situation or is it a family that's taking 

advantage of this provision under the law. And I don't have a sample--I 

really don't have a suggestion for how to regulate that, I'm afraid, 

right now. 

MR. BERGERON: That's okay. I just wanted to make sure that, as we 

address the issues, that we address whatever your concerns are. And if 

others have concerns about that, we'll ask them about that, too. 

Danny, I think, maybe has a question. 

MR. MADZELAN: Yeah, Pat, I had one question about your comment 

with respect to cohort default rate calculations. And somehow--

providing for an automatic appeal. 

Just let me--the--right now, you can--I think the word we use is 

"challenge"--the calculation. And that's--you know, do you have the 

right number in the numerator and the right number in the denominator, 

that kind of thing. But the appeal--what we talk about is in the 

context of a proposed sanction. And so, I know that the community 

colleges and others have proposed some kind of an annual--I don't know 

quite the right way to say this--reporting or indicator by the 

Department that if this particular year's default rate were to, you 

know, result in a proposed sanction, it really wouldn't because the 

school has few borrowers or something like that. So, I guess my 

question is--are--because an appeal of a sanction only occurs when the 

sanction is being proposed, either three years of high default rates or 

the one year over 40, are you suggesting that every year--that when we 

publish a cohort default rate, if it is high--you know, over 25 

percent, that we automatically indicate that, yeah, this is high, but 

you know, it would not be one of the three years, for example, that 

would count towards a possible sanction. 

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Again, I'm--part of this I'm struggling with this is the way 

we've constructed our cohort default rates where you can challenge one 

thing and appeal something else. And-- 

DR. HURLEY: Right. Well, since that provision is in the law as 

almost an exemption, we would like to treat it as--I mean, my--this is 

my point of view--it should be treated as an exemption. It could easily 

be part of the FISAP. Schools could report their loan participation 

rates, and if they fall below that, then they don't even go into the 

calculation of the cohort default rate. Now, that would be my 

preference. 

MR. MADZELAN: Okay. So, there would be, in your view, some--in 

some fashion, the Department would collect on an annual basis--either 

the FISAP or some other mechanism, kind of that--you know, the eligible 

student borrowing population, because I think that's the main piece in 

that appeal calculation. 

DR. HURLEY: Right. 

The reason for this is--I've been doing this a long time. And 

going back to when rates were high, because the formula was treated a 

little bit differently, there were colleges that had very low 

participation rates, like 1 percent of their students borrowed, but 

because they were over the 25 percent default rate, there were articles 

appearing in papers that the schools--that the community colleges were 

going out of business, that they were going to be closed by the state, 

and that impacted the institutions in a negative way even though none 

of that was true and their student loan borrowers were a very small 

percentage of their aid recipients. So, that's the type of thing we 

were trying to address. 

MR. MADZELAN: Okay. Thank you. 

DR. HURLEY: Thank you. 

MR. BERGERON: Margie Carrington, please. Good morning. 

MS. CARRINGTON: Good morning. I'm Margie Carrington. I'm the 

Director of Financial Aid Services at Canada College in Redwood City, 

and I'm also the Vice President of the California Community Colleges 

Student Financial Aid Administrators Association, CCCSFAAA, and I'm 

here to represent that group. Our association represents financial aid 

professionals at all 110 community colleges in the state, and we have 

more than 2.5 million students, and that comprises one of the largest 

segments in the world of education, and much of what I'm going to say 

13 
is a similar iteration of what Pat just spoke to from the community 

college perspective. We worked closely with CASFAA, the state's 

association, in developing--bringing forward issues that are important 

to our segment. So, with that, I'm going to speak again about the 

cohort default rate, and Pat, I think, addressed some of those 

questions. 

For CSFAA, we strongly recommend that the Department implement a 

front-end low participation rate exemption from the cohort default rate 

calculation through modifications of data collection fields on the 

FISAP. For community colleges in particular, having the front-end 

exemption would reduce staff time from completing the appeal process on 

the back end, as well as Department time in reviewing and approving 

them. So, it's a labor issue and a resource issue in and of itself if 

it's going to be approved on the back end, anyway, because they meet 

this low participation rate threshold. It doesn't make sense to use our 

staff time for those kinds of things when they could be better used 

doing outreach, assisting students and doing all the different things 

our offices are charged with that really make financial aid a very 

important part of our institution. It's anticipated that the additional 

third year will increase our CDRs by up to 50 percent. And for schools 

who are--participation rates meet the appeal threshold, this creates an 

onerous burden. 

Another issue that's very important to the community colleges--

again, because of our open access nature--is the ability to benefit. 

The new provisions in HEOA permit schools to determine--that students 

meet ability to benefit after satisfactorily completing six credit 

hours of applicable units towards their degree or certificate offered 

by that school. We would like to offer our assistance to the Department 

in developing regulatory language since this provision is based on the 

outcomes of experimental sites at California community colleges. 

Entrance counseling--and Pat mentioned that on behalf of CASFAA--

we've actually received verbal confirmation from Congressman Miller's 

staff that the intent was to reinstate both loan entrance and exit 

counseling as allowable services that lenders and guarantee agencies 

may provide with schools so long as the school maintains control over 

those sessions. 

We recommend a "dear colleague" letter to clarify that this is an 

allowable provision with an effective date so schools can reach out to 

14 
their educational partners for support of this important activity. And 

lastly, again, with the easy FAFSA and simplification, there are 

numerous provisions related to the simplification of the FAFSA in the 

legislation, including cutting the current number of questions by 50 

percent. And as you previously indicated, the Secretary has now 

released some ideas of what that might be, the change in need. We also 

seriously question how this can be done while maintaining the integrity 

of the FAFSA's ability to screen students for basic Title IV 

eligibility. 

For certain students whose income is solely based on regular 

earnings reported on W2s, and again for those eligible for--and 

participating in program such as TANF, SSI, and other need-based public 

service programs, the approach may be appropriate. But again, we're 

concerned about the loopholes that a simplified form will create for 

the self-employed and those in more complex financial situations and 

circumstances. While we recognize all the inadequacies of the current 

system, we urge the Department to approach FAFSA revisions cautiously 

and with sufficient testing to avoid creating more loopholes and 

unfairness in the system. And again, our segment will be happy to 

assist in any way in reviewing whatever those proposals are. 

On behalf of CSFAA, I thank you for the opportunity to share our 

concerns, as well as offer our services as a resource to the Department 

through the negotiated and proposed rulemaking process. Thank you. 

MR. BERGERON: I think we may have a question or two. 

On the proposal to deal with cohort default rate--the sanction 

problem on the FISAP, the FISAP is only used by institutions that 

participate in the campus-based programs. There are some community 

colleges that don't. So, we don't--that may not be the perfect 

mechanism. More significantly, the institutions may not relate to us 

for campus-based purposes in the same way they do for loans. You know, 

they may combine or split out for campus-based purposes. So, is there 

some alternative mechanism that you can envision that would help us not 

be faced with a system that works for a segment but not--all the 

institutions? 

MS. CARRINGTON: At this moment, I can't think of something, but 

there--because the data on the FISAP that we're reporting--I actually 

didn't realize that all schools aren't reporting, even if it's zero, 

because they're reporting their enrollment and they're also reporting 

15 
their annual Pell and ACG and SMART, which is collected elsewhere as 

well. So, it's just matching data. know that there's been some other 

suggestions of using some annualized data, TICAS, I think, has written 

a letter to Secretary Spellings on a different proposal on determining 

the low participation rate based on aggregate data that's collected 

elsewhere. But their approach is not--we're looking for that front-end 

exemption because of the intensive work and negative press and other 

kinds of things that surround the potentially erroneous perception that 

the school is not doing well because of this high default rate. 

Our school, for example, in 2000, had a high default rate, and we 

pulled out of the loan program; we've just reentered it. And that's one 

of the reasons why a lot of community colleges have decided not to 

offer loans as an option to their students, which is a disservice, 

because that might be the resource that the student really needs to be 

successful, but I know that is a concern in our segment. Because of 

open access, we can't control the admissions; we take everybody. We 

have a mission that's very diverse, and to be penalized because a small 

percentage of our students borrow and then end up defaulting because of 

their circumstances--it's counterproductive to what we do. So... 

MR. MADZELAN: I think we're asking a couple of these questions 

because we have been thinking about this. I mean, you referenced the 

letter that the Secretary received. She's received a couple on this 

topic. 

MS. CARRINGTON: Yeah. 

MR. MADZELAN: So, we're--you know, we are interested in it as 

well, and so, this is the reason for some of our probing here, is just 

to help us think about this as well. 

MS. CARRINGTON: I know our plan is to submit more detailed 

written comment by October 8, so I'll bring this back to our 

association's leadership and we'll discuss and see if we can actually 

come up with some alternative that would meet that same need. But it is 

important for us. 

MR. BERGERON: Thank you. 

MS. CARRINGTON: Thank you. 

MR. BERGERON: Deb Banker-Garcia [sic.]. 

MS. BARKER-GARCIA: Sorry for the bad handwriting. 

MR. BERGERON: Actually, somebody had rewritten it for my list. 

So, it was actually easy to read, except the light. 

16 
MS. BARKER-GARCIA: Too many last names--the whole thing. 

Good morning. 

MR. BERGERON: Good morning. 

MS. BARKER-GARCIA: My name is Deb Barker-Garcia, and I am the 

Director of Client Services for the Southern California Region at 

EDFUND. 

EDFUND is a not-for-profit public benefit corporation, and one of 

the Nation's leading providers of student loan guarantee services under 

the Federal Family Educational Loan Program. EDFUND offers students a 

wide variety of financial aid and debt management information while 

supporting schools with advanced loan processing solutions and default 

prevention techniques. EDFUND was founded in 1997 by the State of 

California through the California Student Aid Commission, and in 2006-

2007, processed more than $9.3 billion in student loans. We manage a 

portfolio of outstanding loans valued at more than $30 billion. 

EDFUND is based in California, and we operate with regional 

representatives such as myself located throughout the Nation. I'm 

pleased to be with you here today to discuss just a few issues that are 

of particular importance to EDFUND and the schools, students, and 

families that we serve, and particularly important to schools here in 

California. I will keep my comments brief here today, but will let you 

know that we will be submitting additional written testimony covering 

these topics and a few additional issues. 

Before I address the specific issues, on behalf of EDFUND, I 

would like to take this opportunity to applaud the U.S. Congress for 

reauthorizing the Higher Education Act through the passage of the 

Higher Education Opportunity Act. I would also like to applaud the 

Department for moving so quickly with the negotiated rulemaking 

process. We at EDFUND believe the law contains many new provisions that 

will continue to open the doors of opportunity for millions of American 

families, and we look forward to working with you in conjunction with 

our trade associations to implement the new laws, with the best 

interests of students and families that we serve at the forefront. 

The first topic I'd like to discuss relates to entrance and exit 

counseling, activities performed by lender and guarantee agencies in 

conjunction with school personnel. Language included in Section 493(e) 

of the HEOA explicitly states that entrance and exit counseling 

activities are not considered a gift under the gift ban section. 

17 
The law also explicitly allows lenders and guarantors to perform 

exit counseling services in Sections 422(d) and 436(c) under the 

supervision of school personnel. Conversations with congressional staff 

have indicated that they believe the language adopted in the HEOA 

permits lenders and guarantors to provide both entrance and exit 

counseling, based on the legislative citations provided and in the 

express congressional intent, we request that the Department modify its 

regulatory position on guarantors and lenders, performing both entrance 

and exit counseling services on behalf of any institution that requests 

it. 

EDFUND believes that allowing lenders and guarantors to assist 

both direct loans and FFEL schools with entrance and exit counseling 

activities is good for schools, good for the loan programs, and most 

importantly, good for the students. As financial aid officers are 

increasingly stretched for resources, lenders and guarantors are best 

equipped to provide the most comprehensive and accurate information to 

student borrowers on the specifics of their loan obligations, and what 

options and programs, federal, state, and institutional, exist to 

ensure a successful repayment experience. Additionally, some of the new 

repayment options and program benefits available to borrowers will 

require more than sound-bite type counseling for borrowers to fully 

understand the options available to them. The new income-based 

repayment option, for example, may require significant explanations 

from knowledgeable staff in order for borrowers to understand how to 

fully take advantage of the new program, a goal I believe we all share. 

We suggest the Department align its regulations with HEOA and 

with congressional intent with regard to entrance and exit counseling 

performed for any FFEL or direct lending institution that may require 

the assistance. The second I'd like to address relates to a new 

provision in the law that requires schools with a cohort default rate 

of 30 percent or more to assemble a default prevention taskforce that 

will create a fully--excuse me--that will create a default prevention 

plan to be submitted to the Secretary. EDFUND, along with our guarantor 

colleagues, believes we can play a valuable role in this process, 

working directly with schools to develop strategies to lower their 

cohort default rates. Guarantors have consistently demonstrated that we 

play an important role in assisting students to successfully manage 

their student loan debt. 

18 
The growing importance of this role has been emphasized by 

increased requirements for guarantee agencies to provide financial 

literacy information and other resources to both schools and students, 

showing our agencies to be knowledgeable and effective trusted agents. 

A school with a higher-than-desired default rate likely does not 

have the resources and experience needed to effectively assist its 

particular constituencies avoid default and delinquency. By including 

the guarantee agency and the taskforce designed to help the school 

develop and implement its default prevention plan, the school is able 

to take advantage of existing resources and expertise as well as 

ensuring that these default prevention plans become the effective tools 

as intended. Guarantors can help find the best tools and implement 

solutions based on what we know and learn in the field from others. 

Additionally, we can act as a third party to help facilitate the 

discussion, and we are seen as that trusted advisor, so we can guide 

the direction and keep them focused on their goals. 

The financial aid office should not be the only Department on 

campus held accountable for defaults. Until the entire campus community 

understands their role, students will continue to fall through the 

cracks and some will default on their student loans. The financial aid 

office will need support from an outside neutral third party to get the 

discussion going and gain support of other campus officials. A 

guarantor can help with this process. Guarantors can also work with the 

Department globally to help develop some default management plan best 

practices that can be provided to both FFEL and direct lending schools 

nationwide. 

The two topics I have addressed here today represent two 

opportunities for the Department to strengthen the students' loan 

program by utilizing the demonstrated experience of the guarantor 

community to better serve postsecondary institutions and the students 

we serve. 

Thank you for the opportunity to speak with you today. 

MR. BERGERON: I think I have one question, and that is--see, I've 

heard this testimony a couple of times already--or read it once and 

heard it once--and I didn't ask the question in Rhode Island and I 

probably should have. 

MS. BARKER-GARCIA: You know, I heard there was going to be no 

questions. 

19 
MR. BERGERON: It's pretty easy. I hope it's pretty easy. 

And on your last point, the role of guarantee agencies in default 

management plans-- 

MS. BARKER-GARCIA: Default management plans. 

MR. BERGERON: Are you suggesting that require schools to include 

GAs, or are you just saying-- 

MS. BARKER-GARCIA: I think we're suggesting that you allow them 

the opportunity to include them--that it's not-- 

MR. BERGERON: In other words that we not prohibit it. 

MS. BARKER-GARCIA: Exactly, that you don't prohibit it. 

MR. BERGERON: Okay. That was all I wanted to-- 

MS. BARKER-GARCIA: That was it? 

MR. BERGERON: --clarify. Yeah, I said that I thought it was 

pretty easy. Thank you. 

MS. BARKER-GARCIA: Thank you. 

MR. BERGERON: Kent Wada. Good morning, Kent. 

MR. WADA: Good morning. My name is Kent Wada. I am the Director 

of IT Strategic Policy at UCLA. Today, I'm representing the University 

of California, with an enrollment of over 220,000 students across 10 

campuses. I'd like to comment on Section 493, Subsection a(29) of the 

HEOA, which establishes a new item within the program participation 

agreement requiring schools to certify that they've developed plans to 

effectively combat the unauthorized distribution of copyrighted 

material and, to the extent practicable, to offer alternatives to 

illegal downloading or peer-to-peer distribution of intellectual 

property. The University of California recognizes illegal peer-to-peer 

file sharing of copyrighted material is a global issue that is 

significantly impacting important economies and industries. 

As creators of intellectual property ourselves, we are taking 

illegal file sharing very seriously and do not condone copyright 

infringement. 

As you consider whether negotiated rulemaking is appropriate to 

implement this new program participation requirement, there are a 

couple of important points we would like to emphasize. First and 

fundamentally, we believe that this problem can only be effectively 

addressed through partnerships. Within the university, illegal file 

sharing is addressed foremost as a student life issue, wherein the goal 

is not only to change behavior, but also to help prepare our students 

20 
for life beyond our walls as ethical and informed citizens. Behind the 

scenes, however, it is also a joint effort between student affairs and 

information technology that makes the approach effective. Similarly, we 

see great value in higher education working collaboratively with the 

entertainment industry and other sectors to develop new technical, 

educational, delivery, and assessment methods that will favorably 

impact the level of and behavior of individuals involved in illegal 

file sharing. 

These partnerships provide us with the insight, expertise, and 

experience to successfully consider and deploy new and effective ways 

to mitigate the problem. This leads me to the second point: It is 

essential that higher education continue to have wide latitude for 

experimentation in determining how best to address this problem, as is 

clearly expressed in the accompanying conference report under Section 

488, rather than being prescribed a specific set of steps, 

technologies, or requirements. 

This is especially true as we also believe that peer-to-peer 

technologies are powerful tools for inquiry and interaction, offering 

opportunity for significant scholarly contribution--collaboration, I'm 

sorry. In moving forward with the implementation of these provisions, 

we hope that the Department will carry out the wishes of the conferees 

in ensuring this flexibility and assuring that each institution retain 

the authority to determine its particular plans for compliance. The 

University of California is ready to assist the Department in any way 

helpful. Thank you. 

MR. BERGERON: Somewhere along the line I had a question that has 

flown out of my brain. 

MR. WADA: Don't look at me, I’m not peer-to-peer. 

MR. BERGERON: I know that some institutions have attempted to 

develop alternatives. One of the--there are two provisions there, one 

that deals with policies and plans to deal with this issue, the other 

is to explore to the extent feasible alternatives. I was wondering if 

you could speak to any success or examples or concerns you have about 

those alternatives. 

MR. WADA: Okay. So, with respect to the looking into legal 

alternatives for digital entertainment, I think--you know, when you 

consider when the language of this legislation was being put together, 

even as short as a year ago, the digital entertainment space was a very 

21 
different place then it is today. If you look around what's available 

on the Net right now--the example I use all the time is all 13 seasons 

of South Park are now available online, free, legally in streaming 

format. And there's just an incredible amount of premium content that's 

being put out there. And so, I guess the caution would be, simply given 

that the space is moving so quickly and the entertainment industry is 

evolving and experimenting and trying so many different things at this 

time to just move a little bit carefully in making any requirements. 

It's actually a very exciting time. 

MR. BERGERON: Okay. Thank you, Kent. 

MR. WADA: Thanks. 

MR. BERGERON: This is why I normally write down my questions in 

the margin, so I remember what they are. 

Steve Mital, please. 

Good morning, Steve. 

MR. MITAL: Good morning, and thanks for holding this regional 

hearing. 

My name is Steve Mital, and I am the Sustainability Director at 

the University of Oregon. 

I'm here today to ask the U.S. Department of Education to include 

full funding for the University Sustainability Grants Program in the 

Administration's 2010 budget request. As one of the Title VIII 

programs, the University Sustainability Grant Program was endorsed by 

over 220 colleges and universities, higher education associations, 

NGOs, and corporations. Hundreds of universities across the Nation, 

including the University of Oregon, have recently focused significant 

resources on "greening" campus operations, updating curriculum to 

reflect the principals of sustainability, and reaching out to educate 

and serve our communities. To manage these and other related 

activities, these institutions, hundreds of them across the country, 

have created sustainability offices, and I'm the Director of one of 

those. 

Indeed, our national campus sustainability LISTSERV advertises 

newly-created sustainability positions at a rate of about three per 

week these days. So, it is--there are lots of opportunities for those 

interested in the field, and it is really incredible how fast 

universities are picking these things up. These offices carry out some 

of the following functions: We develop indicators of sustainability 

22 
performance and appropriate monitoring and reporting protocols for our 

institutions. We developed climate action plans to chart a course for 

significant reduction of greenhouse gas emissions on campuses We 

identify opportunities to reduce the campus environmental footprint 

through smarter building design, increased reliance on renewable 

energy, recycling programs, alternative transportation initiatives, 

purchasing policies that take into consideration lifecycle costs, and 

support for local food production systems. 

We also support a wide range of student-led initiatives to green 

campus operations. This gives students, of course, some on-the-ground 

real-life experience in putting their values and principles and things 

that they're learning in classrooms in action. And finally, we support 

education and outreach to the campus community and surrounding 

community as well. So, taken as a whole, institutions of higher 

education have created a very significant demand for wind energy, which 

has helped finance their construction around this country. 

Higher education has also built a large percentage of all LEED 

certified buildings. LEED is the program under which--that certifies 

buildings for smart energy and environmental design. It is largely--

widely recognized as a national standard. Higher education--excuse me, 

17 million students are enrolled in institutions of higher education, 

and many of them have their first encounter with a recycling bin, a 

public bus, and a reusable coffee mug as a freshman on one of our 

campuses. They develop, therefore, good recycling habits on our 

campuses. As an example, the University of Oregon--our recycling rate--

that is, if you take the percentage of all of the trash that we 

generate on our campus--50 percent of it gets recycled. 

Students learn that the bus and the bike are viable forms of 

transportation. And again, at the University of Oregon, 69 percent of 

all students living off-campus--not the ones on-campus, but the ones 

living off-campus--use some form of alternative transportation to get 

to campus each day, and about 30 percent of our faculty do as well. 

More than 500 presidents of colleges and universities have signed 

the President's Climate Commitment. This initiative obligates those 

institutions to achieve carbon neutrality by the year 2050. So, it's a 

very aggressive commitment that we've signed. The initiative is an 

example of large-scale, voluntary carbon emissions reduction programs. 

23 
Along with our sister institutions in the university--in the 

Oregon University system, and with support from our Governor and State 

Legislature, we have a goal to power our campuses with 100 percent 

renewable energy as part of our strategy to reduce our emissions in 

line with that Presidents Climate Commitment that I just mentioned. So, 

we are working very hard to transform our campuses into 21st century 

models of sustainability, and hundreds of other campuses across the 

Nation are embarking down similar paths. The authorization of the 

University Sustainability Grants Program at the Department of Education 

will provide the catalyst for schools and higher education associations 

to develop and implement more initiatives and best practices based on 

the principals of sustainability. One small example of a creative 

approach to sustainability, outreach, and service that this program 

could support is at the University of Oregon's award-winning what we 

call "Climate Masters Program," which is being now replicated elsewhere 

across the country. 

So, folks at the University of Oregon did a "train the trainer" 

program and offered 30 hours of free training to anybody in the 

community--not the university--not the campus community, but the 

surrounding community in Eugene, training to--how they could implement 

ways of reducing carbon in their daily life and at a residential scale. 

Those trainers then have to dedicate an additional 30 hours in their 

neighborhoods. And the results of the first year program show that 

every person participating in that effort reduced his or her emissions 

by two tons over the course of a year. Like I said, this program is 

being replicated across the country now. 

We shouldn't forget the significant potential for cost savings 

embedded in sustainability. Simple efficiency upgrades, conservation 

practices, smarter purchasing policies have been proven to save 

millions of dollars from operating budgets, and this in turn can have 

an impact on student tuition and fees. So, as we begin to connect the 

dots among our Nation's many challenges in energy, national security, 

sustainable economic development, environmental protection, and social 

justice, it is imperative that our schools incorporate this fundamental 

perspective in their teaching, their practice, and their service. So, 

in closing, higher education is embarking upon an ambitious and highlyvisible transition to become models of sustainability, and I applaud 

Congress for recognizing the need to help, and I'd like to urge you to 

24 
fund the University Sustainability Program at $30 million, which is a 

level sufficient to make a meaningful difference on hundreds of 

campuses and the communities we serve, and indeed sustain the momentum 

we have already built. 

 Thank you. 

MR. BERGERON: I have a couple of comments--or a comment and a 

question. The Higher Education Opportunities Act authorizes 69 new 

programs. 

MR. MITAL: Yeah, I've heard. 

MR. BERGERON: The Congress in its action funded three of those 

programs through savings in the student aid area--student loan area--

and funded three within the Bill: A post-baccalaureate program for 

Hispanics-serving institutions, a master's program at historically 

Black colleges, and a master's program at predominantly Black 

institutions. It seems to me that, you know, Congress could have chosen 

to fund this program with savings--with those savings, instead. So, I 

just--that's a caution about this that the--you know, this is competing 

against other priorities for existing programs and new programs. And 

so, a follow-up question, having made that comment or observation--that 

is, what's the compelling federal need--you described actions that 

institutions are already taking with their own resources. And so, could 

you speak to why this is a compelling federal issue that requires 

federal funding. 

MR. MITAL: Sure. And that's a very good question. 

Like I said, we have embarked down this path already, and lots of 

funding has been committed. The thing that's on the horizon that I 

don’t believe universities and colleges around the country have really 

found the resources for is to implement their climate action plans 

that, like I said, more than 500 of our colleges and universities are 

currently developing. As one example, the University of Oregon has just 

a year left now to get its climate action plan submitted to the--to the 

Presidents Climate Commitment Group that oversees all of these. And 

after we turn in that plan and have it--we will then have a period of 

time under which to implement it. 

That is something that, across the Nation--at universities and 

colleges across the Nation, there really has not been significant 

funding internally or externally identified to support that. So, the 

25 
potential to save those emissions is tremendous. The funding to carry 

it out is not really there yet. 

MR. BERGERON: Thank you. 

MR. MITAL: Thank you. 

MR. BERGERON: Kate Harold. 

Good morning, Kate. 

MS. HAROLD: Good morning. 

My name is Kate Harold, and I’m Director of West Coast Operations 

for the RIAA, which is the Recording Industry Association of America. 

The RIAA's several hundred-member companies are responsible for 

creating, manufacturing, and/or distributing 90 percent of all sound 

recording sold in the United States. Music has never been as accessible 

to fans as it is right now, and our studies show that more music is 

being acquired than ever, but less and less of it is being paid for, 

and therein lies one of the great challenges: It's just way too easy to 

get for free without compensating the creators. U.S. copyright 

industries account for 6 percent of the Gross Domestic Product, and one 

of the very healthiest balances of trade of any American industry. 

Copyright industries are not only leaders in creativity but in 

the economy as well. While there have been bright spots in sales of 

digital tracks over the past few years, even including digital track 

sales, the sale of recorded music has been down for the last seven of 

eight years, amounting to an aggregate fall from 1999 through 2007 of 

roughly 25 percent, and more than a $3 billion decline in sales. 

According to a recent report on music piracy by the Institute for 

Policy Innovation, this translates into 70,000 lost jobs and almost 

$2.7 billion in wages for U.S. workers. These numbers give a clear 

understanding of why we are so concerned with the problem of illegal 

file trafficking and why the problem extends beyond our industry, 

affecting not only this state but the economy of the entire country. 

They also show why we are so pleased with the provisions outlined in 

the HEA. The fact is that illegal file trafficking remains a 

disproportionate problem on college campuses. According to market 

research firm, MPD, college students alone account for more than 1.3 

billion illegal music downloads in 2006. College students surveyed by 

MPD reported that more than two-thirds of all the music they acquired 

was obtained illegally. 

26 
Some universities, including some in California, have offered 

legal music services to their students as an alternative to engaging in 

theft over their networks. We appreciate the HEA's recognition of these 

programs and the advantage provided to schools that choose to adopt 

them. We also appreciate the HEA's recognition of the importance of 

using blocking or filtering technologies. Certainly, the schools that 

have had the greatest success in stemming the massive infringement 

occurring on their networks have implemented effective technological 

measures to either block peer-to-peer entirely or filter to prevent 

illegal activity. The reports of savings to institutions due to the use 

of technological solutions are compelling. For example, the University 

of Florida saved $1.5 million by deferring a network upgrade for two 

years. 

Likewise, the University of Utah has reporting saving $1.2 

million in bandwidth cost and about $70,000 in personnel costs. These 

technologies have proven to be affordable. 

When schools such as Vanderbilt report spending more than 

$500,000 on educating students and dealing with infringement on the 

network, the relatively small outlay in effective technology is an 

obvious and smart investment. We hope schools will acknowledge the 

HEA's inclusion of technology-based deterrents in their reporting 

requirement, and take advantage of these effective measures. Higher 

education institutions have a major part to play in addressing the 

problem of illegal file trafficking online. This activity has caused 

extensive damage not only to our industry in this state, but to the 

country as a whole, and we are very grateful to the attention brought 

to it by the HEA. 

We thank the Department for holding these hearings and for your 

anticipated involvement. Thank you. 

MR. BERGERON: Thank you. Thank you. 

We're going to take a break, because we're to the point where we 

should be at 10:30. So, we're going to go ahead and take a break until-

- 10:30-10:40? 

MR. MADZELAN: Let's say 10:30. 

MR. BERGERON: Let's say 10:30. Okay. So, we'll take a break 

until 10:30. 

Thank you. 

[Brief recess.] 

27 
MR. BERGERON: We're going to go ahead and reconvene. I think 

we're going to go ahead and reconvene. Our next witness is Phyllis 

Jacobson. Good morning, Phyllis. And could you remind us where you're 

from and--for the record. Thank you. 

MS. JACOBSON: Certainly. Good morning, gentlemen. 

I'm Dr. Phyllis Jacobson. I'm the Administrator for Educator 

Examinations for the California Commission on Teacher Credentialing, 

which is California's state teacher licensing agency, and I am here 

representing the Commission today. The Commission is the oldest 

independent teacher standards and licensing board in the Nation, and is 

one of 20 such independent teacher licensing boards across the United 

States. 

We would like to express our appreciation for holding a Title II 

public input session here in California. I would like to address three 

areas within the reauthorizing legislation: eligibility to apply for 

federal grants, accountability provisions for programs that prepare 

teachers, and candidate privacy issues relating to score reporting. 

The first area concerns eligibility to apply for federal grants 

under the Act, including the partnership grants. Section 200 contains 

the definitions of eligible educational service agencies that can apply 

for discretionary funding under federal teacher quality and related 

grant initiatives. This list includes only three types of state 

educational agencies: the state educational agency, which is typically 

the state department of education, the state board of education, and 

the state agency for higher education. The list does not include the 

fourth type of state education agency operated by 20 states including 

California, which is the independent teacher licensing agency. We are 

typically independent from and not part of any of the three state 

educational agencies referenced in the current version of the 

definitions. Unless these definitions are modified, all of us 20 

independent state educational service agencies that are teacher 

licensing boards will be systematically disenfranchised from being 

eligible to submit applications for grant funding. However, we are the 

very state educational service agencies responsible for the preparation 

and certification of teachers, and we also are the agencies that work 

with teacher preparation institutions to prepare the required Title II 

report. We should be eligible to apply for federal funding under the 

Act. 

28 
California respectfully requests that the definitions under 

Section 200 be expanded to include state teacher licensing boards or 

agencies as a fourth type of educational service agency, and that we be 

listed as eligible applicants to apply for federal funding under the 

Title II Teacher Quality Enhancement Initiatives and Related Federal 

Initiatives. The second area we would like to comment on concerns 

Section 205, accountability for programs that prepare teachers. The 

legislation now requires states to report average scaled scores for all 

students who take required teacher licensing assessments. 

As guidance and regulations for crafting--are crafted for 

implementing this Section of the Act, California wishes to raise the 

following questions and concerns. Our first concern is the purpose and 

intended use of reporting scaled scores on teacher licensure 

assessments. State teacher licensing agencies, including the California 

Commission on Teacher Credentialing, establish a passing-score 

standard, or a cut score, for each standardized teacher licensure 

assessment. That score represents the point at which a candidate is 

deemed to be competent in the subject of the examination. 

As long as a candidate meets the passing score standard 

established by the state, and is deemed to be competent in the subject 

of the examination, the individual candidate's actual scaled score, as 

well as candidate aggregated-scale scores are not relevant to a state 

credentialing purpose or to a licensing decision. If the state's cut 

score is reported to the Department of Education for each assessment 

required in the credentialing process, and the numbers of candidates 

who meet the cut scores are also reported, then we do not see what 

purpose would be served by reporting individual candidate and aggregate 

candidate scaled scores, in addition to the number and percent of 

candidates passing these assessments. 

We suggest that the implementation regulations allow for 

reporting state-established, scaled, cut scores, and the number and 

percent candidates meeting that standard rather than requiring all 

programs to report individual candidate's scaled score data. 

Supporting our implementation recommendation is the fact that licensure 

assessments are criterion referenced and not norm referenced. Score 

comparisons across examinees, such as aggregate scaled scores required 

under the Act, are not appropriate for a criterion-referenced 

examination. 

29 
In the context of a criterion-referenced examination, a standard 

is established, and each candidate is assessed against that standard. 

The performance of other examinees on the same assessment is not 

relevant, as each individual examinee must independently meet the 

standard on his or her own, and the examinee's score is neither 

dependent on nor tied to the performance of any other examinee. In a 

norm-referenced assessment context, the performance of a given examinee 

is assessed in comparison to the performance of other examinees. But 

standardized tests for teacher licensure are not used in a normreferenced manner, and aggregating the scores across examinees is 

inappropriate for this type of assessment. Using scores in this manner 

is not consistent with the standards for educational and psychological 

testing established by the American Educational Research Association. 

We would also like to raise some concerns and issues about 

potential difficulties relating to the requirement for how the 

standardized assessment outcomes are to be reported. For example, 

enrolled candidates may take only some subtests of a given examination 

and not complete the entire examination within the Title II reporting 

period. Each of California's standardized licensure assessments has 

several subtests. Would programs be reported to require--would be 

required, excuse me, to report candidate's scores based on the 

individual subtests, or would scores by subtest, as well as the total 

across all subtests be required? Which score would be reported, the 

time the candidate initially tried the assessment or the final score? 

What about candidates who may not have completed all of the subtests of 

a required licensing examination, but who may have scores in only one 

or more parts at the time of the required Title II report? 

Another potential difficulty is the fact that not all candidates 

indicate their institution when they register for these assessments, 

nor are they required to do so. Candidates may actually request that 

their scores not be provided to any institution until such time as they 

are ready to use these scores for licensure purposes. Since 

institutions may not receive complete reports about their students, 

what would happen to them if they reported incomplete results? 

In addition, licensure assessments are not static entities, but 

are constantly changing, even during a given academic year. Not all 

candidates in a given teacher preparation program may have taken the 

same teacher licensure assessments. All candidates' scores would not be 

30 
reflective, therefore, of a single examination, but could represent 

several examinations. How would such varying and different examination 

data be reported and viewed by Title II, since each examination could 

apply to a different number of candidates, and not all candidates, and 

each examination might have its own different cut score? Another key 

issue that California is concerned about is the fact that many states, 

including us, are now using a variety of required teaching performance 

assessments. These are mandated assessments required of all candidates, 

but they do not provide scaled scores. They are rubric-based, and they 

may vary from institution to institution, and cut scores may vary from 

institution to institution. Even though each of these assessments must 

be state-approved, the fact that they vary so widely causes us to 

wonder how these would be treated within a Title II report, and whether 

they need to be reported, given that they do not meet the scaled-score 

requirement. Given this situation, we recommend that implementation 

regulations need to consider whether performance assessments such as 

these would be reported, and if so, how scores would be reported since 

there are no scaled scores, different institutions are using different 

models of the assessment, and the passing score standard can vary both 

within model and across models. 

How would such widely variant data be useful to the Department, 

and what purpose would be served in reporting these types of 

performance data? 

The final area on which we would like to comment is candidate 

privacy issues. The requirement to report individual candidate's scores 

may conflict with FERPA provisions, and may put individual teacher 

preparation programs, as well as the state, at risk of a lawsuit. 

Requiring teacher preparation institutions to report individual 

candidate's scaled scores when the candidates themselves do receive 

these scores, the programs do not receive these scores, and candidates 

are not even required to report these scores to their programs until 

they are ready to be used for credentialing purposes could potentially 

be a violation of candidate privacy rights. We believe that we should 

not be responsible for requiring candidates to provide private 

information about themselves for release to the federal government 

without the candidate's permission, and that to do so would potentially 

put institutions at risk of a lawsuit. In addition, programs that have 

a small number of candidates, such as more than ten but fewer than 50, 

31 
for example, would be reporting data that could allow for individual 

identification of candidates and their private information, which would 

also be a potential violation of candidate privacy. We request that the 

regulations clearly address these issues of candidate privacy, and how 

the inherent conflict between federal reporting requirements under the 

Act, and federal and state privacy rights for candidates can be 

resolved. This concludes our comments, and we thank you very much for 

this opportunity to provide input. 

MR. JENKINS: I'll just make one comment. 

The Department, of course, administers FERPA, and I could not 

imagine that the Department would have programmatic requirements which 

would bring an institution or any other entity into violation of FERPA. 

MR. BERGERON: The only other comment I'd make is that the first 

issue you raised concerning the eligibility of state teacher licensing 

boards for grants is one where it wouldn't be--as Harold described it 

earlier--filling in the blanks where Congress hasn't written things 

into the law. It would be adding a new category which would be changing 

the statute, I think, if I heard you right, or were you suggesting that 

we, in interpreting one of the categories that are listed--interpret it 

to include state's teacher licensing boards? 

MS. HAROLD: We would appreciate such interpretation. We 

understand that you may not be able to change the law, but we believe 

that the--there was no intent on the part of Congress to disenfranchise 

state teacher licensing boards, which are the very entities responsible 

for assuring initial teacher quality. 

MR. BERGERON: Okay. Thank you. Ralph Wolff. Good morning, 

Ralph. 

MR. WOLFF: Good morning. My name is Ralph Wolff, and I am the 

President and Executive Director of the Accrediting Commission for 

Senior Colleges of the Western Association of Schools and Colleges, 

WASC. We accredit 157 colleges and universities here in California, 

Hawaii, the Pacific Islands, serving well over 800,000 students. 

I'm also representing our sister accrediting association, the 

Community College Commission, which accredits more than 140 two-year 

and community colleges, and they serve well over a million students. 

We also participate in C-RAC, and you'll be hearing--if you've 

already heard from one, then you'll be hearing from others of my 

colleagues. So--and as you know, regional accrediting bodies are one of 

32 
many accreditors, and we accredit all the major public and private 

universities, over 3,000, that serve 17 million-plus students. We take 

our responsibility seriously, and both the Community College Commission 

and we have had to take actions in the past several years to terminate 

accreditation of institutions when problems we found were not 

corrected. We can be, and are, tough when needed, and as I'll discuss 

later, we want to make sure we have the ability to take appropriate 

action when needed, especially when breaches of integrity are found. 

At the same time, we work with primary--with major research 

universities, Stanford, University of Southern California--Pepperdine, 

here, we accredit--and the entire University of California system, so 

we need to have flexibility to work with a wide range of institutions. 

Obviously, as you know, we've changed our focus in accreditation, 

the focus on student learning, a great deal, and my own commission 

completely revamped our entire process to be learning-centered. We have 

worked well with the staff of the Department as we've gone through our 

own reviews and really have been found to meet all of the requirements. 

But I also want to say we really need to support the peer review 

character of accreditation in working through with regulations. In 

2007, I also had the opportunity to serve on the negotiated rulemaking 

panel, which was really a real learning opportunity for me, and I 

wanted to offer a few observations as we go through the next neg-reg 

process, and then make a couple of comments about specific provisions 

in the bill. 

If I may, I would like to say that, one, I'd encourage keeping 

the focus narrow. This is a very long bill with many provisions, and a 

number of the accreditation provisions in the law are important. And as 

you know, any new rules are going to have an impact, not only on us, 

but all 3,000 institutions, and therefore, they can add a great deal of 

cost and burden to our institutions. So, we'd encourage that the 

rulemaking process be focused on those areas that really need new 

regulations. Some provisions of the law are really quite clear, and in 

fact, we would just urge be restated in any regulatory process rather 

than add additional interpretation. Second point would be to keep the 

regulations straightforward, and make sure they're feasible to be 

implemented. 

In the last rulemaking process, one of the big debates was 

whether or not we could even implement some of the proposed changes, 

33 
even if they were good ideas, given the wide range of our institutions 

and the limited data capacity in a number of cases. One of the new 

provisions in the law calls for authentication of distance learning 

students. I think it's an important provision, but all of us are trying 

to figure out what's the best way to address this, and what is the 

appropriate technology? And so, in this area, we'd encourage that 

there be flexibility in allowing the technology to catch up with the 

provisions here of how we would do that, and not to prescribe a 

particular approach. 

Third point would be to have the right people at the table. We're 

not quite sure how you're going to incorporate the accreditation 

provisions. There are not a large number of them--and so, that they'd 

be grouped together in an appropriate context for rulemaking--where 

people who are knowledgeable about accreditation issues can be involved 

and, if possible, I'd certainly have--be--welcome the privilege to 

participate again. But I want to ask that the right people be at the 

table--that there be fair and representative participation of regional, 

national, and specialized accreditors proportionate to our 

representation of students and institutions. We can speak best to what 

we actually do, and what the impact will be, and we'd ask the same--

that institutional representatives be, in fact, truly representative of 

the major institutional types of higher education, proportionate to 

their enrollment of students. 

Fourth is to create regulations that permit multiple approaches 

rather than one-size fits all. We debated a lot about that in last 

neg-reg process. As you know, one of the great strengths of American 

higher education and of accreditation is our diversity. And on any 

given issue, there are so many different ways to approach or address a 

provision in the law--we'd like to request flexibility as regulations 

are drafted. We certainly want to address the spirit of the law, and 

even the letter, but to make sure there is flexibility to do so. With 

that, I want to just talk about a few specific principals. 

There are changes in the law dealing with accreditation on due 

process, and all of the regional accrediting bodies have gone through 

the current regulatory process and we have extensive due process 

procedures that all of us have been accepted through departmental 

review. They do work well, and the new law adds a provision in an 

appeal process to allow for new financial information to be reviewed--

34 
to be received and reviewed, even after a final decision, and even 

during an appeal. And the appeal looks backward at the evidence that 

was available at the decision; this allows for new information. 

The law itself is quite clear, and all of us are actually working 

together to develop a process that will respond. One of our commissions 

already does permit this, the New England Commission. We'd urge that 

any new regulations regarding due process be straightforward, allow for 

different approaches, and not go beyond what is already stated, we 

think, quite clearly in the law. For example, the law mentions that 

legal counsel is to be permitted in appeals proceedings. We already do 

that, but how they're to be involved or engaged should be left to each 

accrediting agency rather than defining what the standards would be. 

We also want to say that there must be a balance for our ability 

to act quickly. We are currently dealing with several institutions 

where we think there may be major issues, and we need to be able to act 

quickly while respecting the right of institutions to appeal. 

Transfer of credit to secondary--which, as you know, is the first 

time it's actually identified in the law. So, a contentious issue in 

the last negotiated rulemaking--here, again, we'd say that the 

provisions in the law are quite clear. Institutions must have and 

publish their policies on transfer of credit and their criteria that 

they will apply in making decisions on transfer. 

Given the directness of the language and the plain meaning of it, 

we would urge that no further interpretation is needed beyond restating 

the law, and we will look at the publication of this in our accrediting 

reviews. With distance education, I've already mentioned the 

authentication provision. I just wanted to state the conferee provision 

did state, "As new identification systems are developed and become more 

sophisticated, less expensive, and more mainstream, the conferees 

anticipate that accrediting agencies and associations and institutions 

will consider their use in the future." And again, I just would like to 

urge that we all work together to develop an appropriate response, but 

not to settle on the precise way in which it will be adopted, because 

we've got to figure this one out. And already, we're starting to talk 

with our institutions, how they're doing that. Finally, as monitoring 

institutional growth, there is new language in the law requiring 

accrediting agencies to "monitor the growth of programs that are 

experiencing significant enrollment growth." We already have that 

35 
practice. In fact, it was a part of our last staff review. We had to 

develop protocols for that. But the idea--the question of what is 

significant, how do you define enrollment, is very dependent on the 

institution's context. In a small institution, it could be one thing, 

in a very large, comprehensive institution--could mean something quite 

different. So, again, we would urge a flexible response that allows us 

to work with each institutional size and context. 

Finally, and to conclude, I just want to reaffirm my personal 

commitment on behalf of WASC, both Commissions of WASC, and speaking 

for all the regional accrediting executives--that we would be glad to 

work with you. We've worked well with the Department in the past and 

feel we can get all these issues resolved and hopefully with a 

successful neg-reg process next time. 

Thank you very much. 

MR. BERGERON: Thank you, Ralph. I've got a couple of things that 

come to mind. First of all, really? You really want to do it again? 

MR. WOLFF: Not really, but we have to. 

MR. BERGERON: No, I appreciate your role the last time and 

enjoyed working with you in that process, even though we didn’t come to 

consensus on that regulatory package. 

As you've been thinking about and looking at the issues around 

distance learning and authentication, you know, I hear you say that we 

should have flexibility and I think that's likely--necessary, given the 

development. Is there--are there some strategies that you are hearing 

from institutions that have particular strength in your view, or is it 

just way too early to know what might be going on that you think is 

workable? And you can just say you think it's too early. I don't want 

to... 

MR. WOLFF: Well, I do think it's too early, but let me just--

let's put it this way: think we all need to talk about how to approach 

it. But I'll give you an example. A number of our institutions have 

said--as we've talked about this issue even before the law was adopted-

-rely on multiple interactions in the course of a week even, or the 

course of a term, that a student needs to log on and engage in both 

threaded and non-threaded conversations, synchronous and asynchronous. 

And so, some institutions say that the very multiplicity of 

interactions--that, a, you couldn't pay somebody to do all of that, and 

secondly, that there is a way of really discerning that somebody would 

36 
do it. So, there's no technological solution for that. Others have 

proctored exams, where they'll exams on a particular site, but not all 

courses have an exam. Some will require papers and the like. Some are 

exploring technological solutions, fingerprint credentialing or iris in 

the eyes, and the like. And that's why we just say that--I think all of 

us are trying to figure out with a wide range of programs that one 

approach may not work given the different range of pedagogical 

approaches to distance learning. 

So, we're trying to ask our institutions--and part of the "too 

early," is how are you thinking of going about doing this? How have you 

been doing it? And it is something that we would see part of our review 

process, and we ourselves need to write protocols of how we would 

expect institutions to come into compliance. 

MR. BERGERON: Okay. When you speak about proportionality on 

negotiating committees, we struggle between size of committee and 

getting the right kinds of representation, and you've been through the 

process. Could you say something about size of committee and how you 

get proportionality in keeping the committee small. 

MR. WOLFF: Well, without trying to be personal about it, there 

were a couple of people in the last neg-reg committee who were there 

because of a very special interest, and not representative of a 

category of either schools or interests. And therefore, in my personal 

opinion, were not able to contribute a great deal to what was really a 

wide range of really important issues that we all--then, and in the 

future, are going to need to talk about. So, my sense is that, number 

one, that there are--over 50 percent of these students today are in 

two-year institutions and public institutions--that there really does 

need to be representation that is effective. I'd also like to say that 

national associations do represent their constituencies. 

There was no one at the table from any of the national 

associations. We didn’t feel we were. We were representing accrediting 

associations and, as you know, Judith Eaton, perhaps. 

MR. BERGERON: Yeah. 

MR. WOLFF: So, it would be the sense of vocational and career 

schools, traditional, regionally accredited schools, some 

proportionality of both institutional representatives as well as 

accrediting agencies. 

37 
It was certainly important to have a range of accreditors at the 

table, because, as you know, the non-regionals have taken some very 

strong steps, and we can all learn from one another. 

MR. BERGERON: Thank you, Ralph. 

MR. WOLFF: Thank you very much. 

MR. BERGERON: Dana Pomerantz [sic.]. 

Good morning, Dana. Thank you for coming. 

MS. POMERANTZ: Good morning. My name is Donna Pomerantz. 

MR. BERGERON: Oh, I'm sorry. 

MS. POMERANTZ: That's fine. Let me get situated, here. Just one 

moment, please. 

MR. BERGERON: Take your time. 

MS. POMERANTZ: My name is Donna Pomerantz, and I am here on 

behalf of the American Council of the Blind. And the American Council 

of the Blind is eager to lend its many years of experience concerning 

accessible, instructional materials by sitting on the Advisory 

Commission on Accessible, Instructional Materials in Postsecondary 

Education for Students with Disabilities, as constructed under the 

Higher Education Opportunity Act. ACB was a leading participant in 

efforts to develop the legislative provisions regarding access to 

textbooks for K through 12 students. We worked tirelessly for over two 

years with blindness organizations and textbook publishers that 

resulted in the instruction--excuse me, in the introduction of the 

Instructional Materials Accessibility Act, which called for a national 

file format and a textbook repository. This legislation was eventually 

incorporated into IDEA in 2004. Since then, staff, has actively worked 

with congressional staff to identify solutions to be included in the 

Higher Education Opportunity Act. This includes--the lighting is very 

interesting for me up here, too. So, bear with me, please. 

MR. BERGERON: I fully understand, because this is very bright 

light that shines in my eyes, making it hard to read the paper in front 

of me. So, I understand exactly what you're going through. 

MS. POMERANTZ: It is. 

MR. BERGERON: Thank you. 

MS. POMERANTZ: And I read probably a font size of approximately 

28 to 36. So, bear with me, as I'm a little bit slower here in the 

reading. will continue. This includes the insertion of language in 

Section 772 that calls for more than one organization representing the 

38 
interests of the blind and visually impaired community on this advisory 

commission. We have access to individuals with both public policy and 

technological expertise who could provide valuable insight to this 

commission. These individuals are well versed in best practices for 

meeting the needs of both blind and visually impaired students. 

ACB has a long history of working together with our student 

affiliate, the National Alliance of Blind Students, to improve both the 

accessibility and quality of education for all students who are blind 

or visually impaired. Because our affiliate is primarily comprised of 

college students, higher education issues are a major part of this 

effort. It is ACB's sincere hope and expectation that we be appointed 

to sit on this advisory commission. We have the expertise and the know 

how to provide leadership regarding this critical issue on behalf of 

college students who are blind or visually impaired. 

Thank you very much for allowing me to comment before you today. 

MR. BERGERON: Questions? I don't think we have any. Thank you, 

Donna. 

MS. POMERANTZ: Thank you. 

MR. BERGERON: David Burns is our next witness. 

MR. BURNS: Good morning. 

MR. BERGERON: Good morning. 

MR. BURNS: My name is David Burns. I am the Director of Emergency 

Management for UCLA. I'm also affiliated with the International 

Association of Emergency Managers as the first Vice Chair of the 

University and Colleges Committee, and President of the California 

Campus and University Emergency Managers Association. I'm speaking 

mainly today about UCLA's issues just as--represent emergency 

management issues. I also have some concerns about fire safety 

standards, but it's not my area of expertise. I'd like to thank you for 

the opportunity to provide comments on the proposed negotiated 

rulemaking process to implement the Higher Education Act of 2008. 

I respectfully request that the Department develop regulations 

for the following public safety emergency provisions contained within 

Title IV, Part G, Section 488 of the HEOA through the negotiated 

rulemaking process--that a separate negotiating committee be 

established for these complex and vital issues surrounding the campus 

environment, and that members of the International Association of 

Emergency Managers, the Universities and Colleges Committee, IAEM UCC, 

39 
be appointed to the negotiated rulemaking process. And part of the 

reason for that is, I think, if you look at campus safety emerging 

after Virginia Tech and national--or Northern Illinois University, and 

many other instances occurring today--just--they had a pipe bomb 

explosion at Florida this morning. There are multiple disciplines 

involved in how public safety and emergency management across campuses 

nationally are comprised. You have law enforcement emergency managers, 

environmental health and safety specialists, fire departments, general 

services, facilities, and a whole other myriad of disciplines and 

institutions on a college campus providing public safety or managing or 

coordinating public safety. In fact, some poor soul gets tapped on the 

shoulder who has no credentialing, no experience, but works there and 

is told, "You are the emergency manager. You now write the plan." 

That's a rare instance, but it's realistic. So, I have concerns about 

the rules, process, and policies associated with rulemaking in the 

following areas: 

Specifically, emergency notification. This is an area of the law 

where the terms used will need to be carefully defined. As an emergency 

management practitioner for 25 years working at the largest populated 

campus in California, it's important to understand there is no 

nationally approved standard for the term "emergency." The U.S. 

Department of Homeland Security, DHS, Federal Emergency Management 

Agency, and the major public safety associations, the International 

Association of Campus Law Enforcement Administrators, IACLEA, the 

International Association of Emergency Mangers, the National Emergency 

Managers Association, NEMA, which is the state directors, the 

International Association of Fire Chiefs, the International Association 

of Chiefs of Police, University and College Section, and the National 

Association of Police Organizations, have yet to agree or establish any 

consensus on the word or term "emergency." Even federal law does not 

address this, except under the Stafford Act for Presidential 

Declarations. So, there is no--and when you throw in "significant 

emergency" or "dangerous situations," which has been used in previous 

legislative attempts at the bills and modifying HEA, you run into some 

real issues. In fact, five new bills have been passed in the last two 

weeks through the House and Senate and may end up in the Higher 

Education Act as addendum bills. 

40 
So, using the events of the past few years as examples, 

notification of an incident needs clear definition for the reporting of 

an event after confirmation of that event and allowance for personal 

evaluation of that event prior to a campus-wide alert. For example, 

does the federal government intend to prescribe a reporting protocol 

for a single student with a transmissible infectious disease such as 

meningitis, or in some instances what Michigan has been dealing with E. 

coli and food poisoning, because public health emergencies don't fall 

under campus and DOE legislative jurisdiction, they fall under public 

health, which is regulated state and federal law. Or for that matter, 

would notification take place for a hurricane that's still days away 

from making landfall? Is notification required for a credible terrorist 

or bomb threat? We deal with these every month, especially during 

finals. There are a myriad of issues that campus emergency officials 

contend with every day in determining appropriate emergency 

notification. The overuse of notification systems can significantly 

disrupt the entire campus community. If the guidelines issued are too 

broad, we can see the emergency notification process will create 

substantial false alarms, which disrupts classes and limits the 

confidence in those systems. 

At worse, it lessens the credibility in campus warning systems 

and procedures. We could actually have people start to ignore them 

because they don't trust them, because they're issued so frequently. 

In all cases, the definitions, the terms, for compliance and, 

more importantly, the exercise of notification procedures need to 

protect those on campus. Judgments or further events off campus that 

may spread to the campus need to be clearly defined. In all instances, 

the professional judgment of first responders, emergency managers, and 

other campus health and safety personnel must be balanced with a 

notification requirement to ensure that emergency situations are 

communicated to those on campus in ways that are timely, accurate, and 

useful. And I haven't even really got into this, but the cost impact of 

an emergency notification is substantial. UCLA has spent $600,000 in 

the past 18 months implementing emergency notification systems. When 

you talk about emergency notification, you're talking about indoor 

systems, outdoor systems, and e-technologies. And since Virginia Tech 

and Northern Illinois, SMS and text messaging have become the popular 

choice, but that could change and those systems aren't effective. These 

41 
systems have to be robust, they have to be redundant, it requires 

multiple systems, it's very expensive. 

The IAM did a research--looking at universities nationwide. It 

would cost each university approximately $1 million to implement 

indoor, outdoor, and e-tech systems that are robust and redundant. 

Nationally, that could cost $4 billion, with a "b." 

The other area of concern is regarding emergency response and 

evacuation procedures. Higher education institutions must provide the 

campus community with a statement of policies and procedures related to 

emergency response and evacuation, in essence, requiring the 

establishment of emergency operations or management plan. This will be 

the most complex issue for negotiated rulemaking. The many different 

missions, resources, programs, structures, and make-up of the country's 

colleges and universities will necessitate a level of flexibility, 

understanding, and care to implement this provision. Even a summary 

discussion of this topic would require a multi-page submission. As a 

campus emergency management practitioner, I'm keenly aware of the need 

to plan for emergencies. I understand that this subject must be given 

special and focused consideration to ensure proper and appropriate 

application across different institutions, and be applicable to all 

hazards, and I strongly encourage the Department to do the same. 

UCLA is an institution comprised of 30 divisions with 340 

separate departments, working at 175 facilities on 419 acres. Do the 

new regulations require annual evacuation exercises at each facility, 

just housing, or both on- and off-campus housing? Only the facilities 

associated with those housing--or various other issues? The Department 

needs to issue clear guidance so the effected public safety disciplines 

can meet the compliance issues under the HEOA. So, given the complexity 

of the issues subject to the new regulations, it's imperative that 

college and university professionals with practical experience of 

credentialing in these areas be included in the substantive rulemaking 

process and discussion. So, again, I formally request the appointment 

of members of the International Association of Emergency Managers, the 

University and Colleges Committee, UCC, to the negotiated rulemaking 

panels involved with these decisions. The IAEM UCC represents the 

emergency management issues surrounding college and university campuses 

at over 400 institutions nationally, and is dedicated to promoting the 

42 
goals and saving lives and protecting property during emergencies and 

disasters. 

 Thank you. 

MR. BERGERON: Any questions? Thank you, David. 

MR. BURNS: Thank you. 

MR. BERGERON: Catherine Graham. Good morning, Catherine. 

MS. GRAHAM: Good morning, David. Thank you. 

MR. BERGERON: Thank you. 

MS. GRAHAM: I'm very excited to be here representing my 

colleagues, Darlene and Crystal, who are practitioners like me, working 

in a financial aid office here in California. My name is Catherine 

Graham. I represent Loyola Marymount University as the Director of 

Financial Aid. Several of my colleagues for which I work with are also 

here. Pat has given some very good testimony today for which we would 

like you to consider to the fullest. I've been in financial aid for 19 

years. I've worked at four schools, and I've been a Director at three. 

I'd like to speak today as practitioner about the impact of the TEACH 

Grant as well as the Part B student loan program. 

As it pertains to the TEACH Grant, the last I checked, there were 

19 schools in California that have implemented this program. We are 

pleased that, on behalf of our students, we have in fact implemented 

this program, for which we expect 450 students to take advantage. 

The implementation program has been tremendous, and we are 

further bogged down by the notion of the entrance counseling 

requirement. So, although I know it's not exactly on the table today, 

I'm hoping that perhaps that could be addressed. More importantly, 

though, we would like to be able to guide and advise our students at 

LMU, and any student that takes advantage of the TEACH Grant Program on 

what their expectations could be, should there be reasonable 

circumstances for which they cannot seek or obtain the employment for 

which the continuation of the program as a grant be sustained. So, at 

this point, I would like to request that the Department establish 

regulations that are broad enough to include a variety of reasonable 

circumstances and a process by which the recipient may appeal a 

negative decision. As it pertains to the Part B student loan program, 

I'm pleased to report that a recent release of our cohort default rate 

was less--was exactly 1 percent, and we attribute our successful 

default rate, as many of my colleagues would do, to the--due to the 

43 
efficient and effective work of their contributions to our in-person 

exit and entrance counseling. I'm speaking of our guarantor and our 

lending partners. We believe that our lending partners and our 

guarantor partners have a very good and precise handle on what is 

happening in the student loan marketplace, and are best equipped to 

guide and advise on both entrance and exit counseling. 

Thus, my point is that we request that the Department reaffirm 

that the role of the lenders and guarantee agencies in both entrance 

and exit counseling are critical. I'd like to thank you for your time 

today, and Loyola Marymount University will be submitting written 

testimony on other issues for which I did not address today. Thank you. 

MR. BERGERON: Thank you, Catherine. Would you like to say 

anything more about the kinds of things that your students--you think 

your students need to hear, particularly when they sign up for a TEACH 

Grant. Is there some central message you would like us to try to find 

to communicate through our whatever-we-do in terms of counseling? 

MS. GRAHAM: The counseling requirement is one of the things that 

we've had to incur a tremendous amount of both fiscal and time burdens. 

We've had to put together the entrance counseling tool. If you could 

hurry along on the entrance counseling tool for TEACH Grant, that would 

be most appreciative. I don't know what message you could give, but we-

-we're struggling with this component. 

MR. BERGERON: Okay. I just was curious if there was something in 

particular as you've been working with students that you think is 

important to get across. 

So, if--as you work on your written comments, if you could give 

us some suggestions on the kinds of messages we need to emphasize in 

developing that tool, that would be great. 

MS. GRAHAM: Thank you very much, David. 

MR. BERGERON: Thank you, Catherine. Sharon Iverson. Good 

morning, Sharon. 

MS. IVERSON: Good morning. I'm here representing the American 

Speech Language and Hearing Association. In doing this, I'm 

representing speech language pathologists throughout the fifty states 

of our Union. The Higher Education Opportunity Act signed into law on 

August 15, 2008 reauthorizes the Higher Education Act of 1965. HEOA 

includes several provisions to make postsecondary education more 

affordable and accessible, including changes in HEA's student loan 

44 
programs. HEOA creates a new loan forgiveness program for professionals 

identified as having a shortage. School-based speech language 

pathologists and audiologists are among other professionals eligible to 

apply for this program: up to $2,000 in a year for no more than five 

years, and $10,000 in the aggregate of outstanding loans would be 

forgiven. It is my understanding that there are no current 

appropriations to fund this program. Loan forgiveness is one tool that 

states and school districts can use to help recruit and retrain 

qualified school-based speech language pathologists and audiologists. 

However, federal education statutes and regulations on student loan 

forgiveness are incongruent and need to be harmonized. There is a 

growing need for school-based speech language pathologists and 

audiologists. The Bureau of Labor Statistics estimates that between 

2004 and 2015, more than 14,000 additional speech language pathologists 

will be needed to fill vacancies, a 15 percent increase in job 

openings. 

Similarly, according to the BLS, more than 3,000 additional 

audiologists will be needed to fill demand between 2002 and 2012, a 29 

percent increase in job openings. Many Title I schools fight a constant 

battle to recruit and retrain qualified personnel, including qualified 

speech language pathologists and audiologists. The U.S. Department of 

Education's 24th annual report to Congress on the implementation of 

IDEA, states that almost half of all school-based SLPs will be eligible 

for retirement by 2017. The study concludes that, unless the number of 

newly prepared SLPs increases substantially, a severe shortage will be 

unavoidable. The new loan forgiveness program under HEA would encourage 

SLP and audiology graduates to accept positions in school-based 

settings. In my district, we have tried sign-on bonuses, we've tried 

stipends onto the teachers' pay scale, and we still--we're the third 

largest school district in the State of California--we still end up 

hiring some years--as high as 15 private sector speech language 

pathologists at a cost of $120,000 per person, whereas our districtbased speech pathologists start at $49,000. 

In addition, the shortage of educational audiologists has emerged 

as one of the most serious challenges in implementing school-based 

hearing and screening programs to ensure that identification, auditory 

management, and the education, communication, and psychosocial needs of 

children with hearing loss and/or auditory processing disorders are not 

45 
neglected, adequate numbers of audiologists must be available to 

provide services to children. In some locations, there is 1 audiologist 

for every 10,000 children, age birth through 21 years old, to provide 

screening and basic diagnostic audiological services. I want to make 

mention that ASHA supports the current statutory regulations related to 

accreditation and requests that the Department of Education not 

consider accreditation as part of the negotiated rulemaking. 

ASHA also supports, as an accrediting body, the Council on 

Academic Accreditation as the recognized specialized accreditor for the 

professions of speech language pathology and audiology. Judgments about 

student achievement should remain in the hands of institutions, and 

should not be shifted to the federal government through the Department 

of Education's role in recognizing accredited organizations. The core 

of accreditors' activities should be on standards to support the 

student acquisition of knowledge and skills on protocols for how 

programs can demonstrate that students are achieving the necessary 

outcomes. Accreditation is a highly successful and well-tested system 

of quality assurance and quality improvement. ASHA requests that the 

Department of Education include speech language pathologists and 

audiologists among the providers eligible for funds under professional 

preparation programs in Title II. Induction into teacher training and 

recruitment efforts should be extended to speech language pathologists 

and audiologists as they are an integral part of the special education 

team. In response to identified shortages of school-based speech 

language pathologists and audiologists, Congress identified them as 

professions eligible for loan forgiveness in areas of national need 

under Title IV, allowing speech language pathologists and audiologists 

access to professional preparation funds under Title II is another 

means by which to retain and recruit these professionals. 

Speech language pathologists and audiologists should be provided 

with the same access to training and education opportunities since they 

are part of a student's education team. I've often been asked by our 

beginning speech language pathologists why, when they work side-by-side 

in small offices that are--often have bathroom tile on the walls--that 

they are not given the same consideration as their special educators 

that they work side-by-side with for loan forgiveness. States should be 

given flexibility to utilize funds to provide training opportunities to 

46 
all professionals who provide services to children in schools. Thank 

you very much for this opportunity to address you. 

MR. BERGERON: Thank you. 

MR. MADZELAN: I do have a question for you. You correctly note 

that this particular provision to which you spoke, this student loan 

forgiveness, is not like our existing teacher loan forgiveness in that 

it is not mandatorily funded. It does require appropriations which the-

-Congress has not done yet--of course, no expectation that they would 

have at this time. But given that, with, you know, a discretionary 

approach to the funding, which means that the Congress would 

appropriate a specific amount of money for this activity, to provide 

loan forgiveness to these persons--is there anything in the statute 

regarding eligibility of persons to receive this loan forgiveness 

benefit that needs to be adjusted, either expanded or perhaps 

constricted? 

Again, the notion is, if the Congress provides a fixed amount of 

money, and that amount is less than the demand that is out there, then 

you kind of turn this into a first-come first-serve benefit. And I'm 

wondering if you think that perhaps a way to address that or perhaps 

mitigate this first-come, first-serve approach is maybe some 

modifications to the eligibility requirements that are specified in the 

statute. I'm wondering if you've given any thought to that, or you 

think the statute is dead-on with respect to the eligible population. 

MS. IVERSON: Well, what I'd like to do in addressing that is get 

back with Catherine Clark, who is ASHA's educational person, and pass 

that along to her, and maybe she could contact you. 

MR. MADZELAN: Yeah, we're still-- 

MR. BERGERON: We're receiving public comment until--in general, 

until October 8th, and we'll have our last hearing in Cleveland on--I 

think it's October 15th. So, we have a little more time in the public 

comment hearing during which we can hear. 

MR. MADZELAN: Yeah, this is the kind of thing we're interested 

in, because these discretionarily funded loan forgiveness programs are 

a special challenge for us to administer. 

MS. IVERSON: Right, I understand. We have a lot of budget issues 

right now. Thank you. 

MR. BERGERON: Can I--I have a question, also, and that is, you 

noted that your school district has used signing bonuses and other 

47 
financial tools to try to encourage people to come and work for your 

district, and you've procured outside services where necessary to fill 

gaps. Have you tried or do you know any other school district that has 

tried to use loan forgiveness as a recruitment tool, and whether--and 

if you do know of any, do you know of any success related to that? 

MS. IVERSON: I do not. The way I understand what I've been told 

from my district is that isn't in the purview of the school districts, 

but maybe it could be. Maybe I just-- 

MR. BERGERON: Yeah, I mean-school districts and other employers I 

know have used loan forgiveness or loan repayment programs where they 

actually make the payments on behalf of the employee while they're 

employed at that institution or that agency to--and for me, I'm trying 

to understand how a school district would use a national benefit to 

recruit students, and I'm having a hard time--I'm struggling with 

understanding how that works. And so, that's why I was asking the 

question if you knew of any... 

MS. IVERSON: No, I do not. 

MR. BERGERON: Could you pass that question along to your national 

association, also. 

MS. IVERSON: I will. Thank you. 

MR. BERGERON: That would be great. Thank you, we appreciate it. 

MS. IVERSON: Thank you. 

MR. BERGERON: Lauren Asher is our next speaker. Actually, Lauren 

is the last person to sign up before lunch. So, if anyone is in the 

room that has not signed up and wishes to testify before we break for 

lunch, that would be very helpful, and if you saw Don or Jessica, that 

would be great. Lauren, nice to see you again. 

MS. ASHER: Nice to see you, too. Can you hear okay through this 

mike? 

MR. BERGERON: Yes. 

MS. ASHER: So, I'm Lauren Asher. I'm the Vice President for the 

Institute for College Access and Success, which is a nonprofit, 

nonpartisan policy research organization. We work to make higher 

education more affordable and available to people of all backgrounds. I 

think you know enough about the HEOA. I won't go into our description 

of it in our written comments. But I want to start with the fact that 

higher education is more important than ever for today's students and 

families and for our economy as a whole. It's also gotten more 

48 
complicated than ever for families to figure out how to pay for 

college. My comments are going to focus primarily--or solely on the 

Title IV provisions, and somewhat narrowly on areas where we have some 

expertise and think the stakes are significantly high for students and 

families. This regulatory process is an important opportunity to 

consider not only the specific provisions in the HEOA, but also how 

well the amended HEA as a whole fulfills the overarching purpose of our 

financial aid system, and that purpose is to give all Americans a fair 

shot at a college education regardless of their income or family 

background. 

The way our financial aid programs are administered makes a 

tremendous difference in whether they actually achieve the intended 

goals of educational opportunity that Congress intended. 

The timing, quality, and accessibility of information about aid--

who is eligible, what is available, what it can pay for, and how to get 

it, these affect critical decisions about whether to go to college at 

all, what kind of college to go to, and how to pay for it. These 

decisions, including whether to borrow, how much, and from whom can 

make the difference between getting ahead and falling behind for a 

lifetime. We ask the Department to approach this rulemaking process 

from the perspective of the students and families who will be affected 

by their recommendations. These include not only today's high school 

juniors and seniors and their parents, but also fifth graders who have 

yet to start even thinking about college, students who are already in 

college and struggling to pay their bills, and millions of borrowers 

who are trying to pay off their student loans without knowing if 

they'll be able to put their own kids through college. We have 

suggestions for several issues, and we recognize that many other 

important issues will be raised by others here today. I also just want 

to clarify whether you'll be accepting additional comments through the 

8th or the 15th. 

MR. BERGERON: We are receiving them through the 8th through our 

e-mail address, and then--but we will have one additional hearing on 

the 15th. 

MS. ASHER: But you'd have to be there in person to submit them. 

MR. BERGERON: Yes, please. 

MS. ASHER: Okay. The first area I want to address is the need to 

improve rules for financial aid information that colleges are required 

49 
to provide to prospective and current students. The Department already 

requires departments to provide a wide range of information about 

financial aid. It should review these requirements with an eye to what 

students and families really need to make informed decisions. 

For example--and these are not exhaustive examples, for 

everyone's sake--the current regulations require colleges to provide 

information about the "general categories" of financial aid that are 

available to their students. This should be amended to require colleges 

to list gift aid separate from loans, distinguish federal from nonfederal loans, and if non-federal loans are listed, to make clear that 

they do not come with the same borrower protections as federal loans. 

Another example: Colleges are required to publish and "make 

readily available upon request to enrolled and prospective students the 

institutions total cost of attendance," among other things. Students 

should not have to request the total cost of attendance figure; 

however, our examination of financial aid award letters from a wide 

variety of colleges around the country indicates that many students 

would have to do just that when they're dealing with the decision about 

whether they can afford that particular college based on the actual 

offer they've received. The total cost of attendance should be provided 

as a matter of course in all financial aid award letters in a way that 

students can see how grant and federal loan aid, separately and 

together, affect their net cost. We also recommend drawing a 

distinction between grant aid that is only available for covering 

tuition at a particular institution and state or federal grants that 

are portable and can be used to cover the full range of college costs. 

As I know you know, there's a lot of misperceptions among students and 

families about what aid can be used for. Often, the assumption is it 

can only be used for tuition and fees, and that can really constrain 

decisions. 

We also want to encourage you to integrate information about 

income-based repayment and public service loan forgiveness into 

existing regulations wherever relevant. The proposed rules for the 

CCRAA don't actually address all those instances. They cover some 

important ones, but there are a lot of other ones throughout the 

regulations. For instance, rules governing entrance and exit counseling 

for federal loans, as well as disclosure requirements for lenders must 

be reviewed in light of the availability of these two new programs, 

50 
which expand repayment and forgiveness options. There's a requirement, 

for example, that entrance counseling include "sample monthly repayment 

amounts," based on several potential factors. These do not currently 

include income. So, income really needs to be factored in, as well as 

indebtedness in providing people with general estimates of what 

repayment might look like, to help them understand whether income-based 

repayment would be useful for them and what it would mean. 

Entrance counseling is also an opportunity to warn students about 

the hazards of private student loans and the availability of Parent 

PLUS Loans, which leads me to a broader point about the need to protect 

students from direct-to-consumer marketing and private loans when 

possible. The Department really should maximize all opportunities to 

distinguish private from federal loans and required information from 

both colleges and lenders. 

The Department should also aggressively monitor the "selfcertification process," established by the HEOA, in which students 

download a form or do something else that they then report to the 

lender with their full cost of attendance and other amounts that could 

lead to excessive borrowing and enable fraud by both lenders and 

borrowers, because those numbers aren't verified by the school. 

There's also a need to reduce the potential for gaming by private 

proprietary schools. The Department should carefully review in 

consultation with experts in consumer protection the changes to the 90-

10 rule for proprietary institutions. For example, the provisions 

allowing some additional revenue to be counted within the 10 percent 

are open to wide interpretation and create the potential for dangerous 

loopholes and gaming. In particular, college could inflate its 

published tuition, let's say, by $5,000, and give all students a $5,000 

grant or tuition discount, and claim that discount as qualifying for 

non-Title IV revenue. The rules should define qualifying discounts in a 

way that prevents this particular form of gaming. It's also important 

to limit conflict of interest between lenders and colleges. I know that 

the HEOA in some ways provides more room for conflict of interest than 

the Department's own proposed regulations. The HEOA does go a long way 

towards limiting conflicts of interest, but it does not eliminate the 

potential for abuse. Students and their families turn to campus 

financial aid offices for help in making wise borrowing decisions, and 

they expect to get full and fair information about their financial aid 

51 
options. The Department needs to set clear parameters about appropriate 

levels of involvement by lenders and guarantors in the loan counseling 

process, and we believe narrow them as much as possible to prevent 

sales tactics that can be hidden in other types of informational 

activities. One way to deal with that is for the Department to develop 

and disseminate tools and information that give colleges good, unbiased 

alternatives to information provided by entities that have a more 

vested and conflicted interest in the students' ultimate decision. 

Finally, we ask the Department to more clearly indicate the 

significance of cohort default rates. Agency review and public scrutiny 

of cohort default rates should focus on institutions where the rate is 

the most likely to represent a real problem with institutional quality 

and compliance. This is not the case at colleges where a low proportion 

of students have federal loans, and that includes most community 

colleges. We recommend the Department clearly distinguish between 

institutions that are subject to sanctions, and those that would likely 

be exempt due to low participation rates; however, we don't necessarily 

recommend not publishing those rates for schools that might meet those 

criteria, and we have provided some suggestions in the past, and we'd 

be happy to continue those discussions. 

So, thank you very much for this opportunity. We may provide some 

additional or more specific notes before the end of the 8th, and are 

available for any questions. 

MR. BERGERON: Thank you, Lauren. 

MS. ASHER: Thank you. 

MR. BERGERON: I think that concludes the list of people who have 

signed up to testify this morning. So, unless there are others who wish 

to testify before we take a break for lunch, we'll adjourn until 1:00. 

 Thanks, everybody. 

[Recess.] 

AFTERNOON SESSION 

MR. BERGERON: Good afternoon. We're going to go back and reopen 

the hearing. We have, at this moment, two people who have signed up to 

testify, and so we'll hear from those two people. If others have an 

interest in testifying, see Don or Jessica and they will sign you up. 

Our first witness of the afternoon is Ronald Johnson. Ronald, welcome. 

52 
MR. JOHNSON: Good afternoon. 

MR. BERGERON: Good afternoon. 

MR. JOHNSON: My name is Ronald Johnson and I am the Director of 

Financial Aid at UCLA, and I wish to concur, first of all, with my two 

colleagues who spoke earlier, Pat Hurley and the President of the 

California Community College Student Association, as we are partners in 

the pipeline of helping students attain their undergraduate degrees. 

I am very concerned about the provision in the Higher Education 

amendments which allows families to refuse to contribute to their 

children's education. I believe this encourages a breach in the 

longstanding partnership of the student, parent, federal government, 

and institution. And if this particular provision or option is allowed 

to be implemented without very detailed oversight, I believe it will 

create and encourage students and mostly parents to ignore their 

responsibility to contribute to their child's undergraduate education. 

More than a third of parents today have either decreased the 

amount of money that they save for the children's college cost or stop 

saving completely, and this was based on a survey that was recently 

done by Fidelity. I am concerned that if this provision is allowed to 

be implemented without, as I said, detailed oversight, it will erode 

the necessity the parents to feel that they must maintain their role in 

the partnership which has been longstanding and has been a tenet of 

financial aid. So, I'm hoping that there will be some very serious 

discussion and review and guidelines that will provide good guidance to 

schools. If families are unable to contribute to their education 

because of reasons of not having the resources, we will certainly 

address that through many of our processes, professional judgment, et 

cetera. The other concern that I have has to do with the FAFSA. As I 

agree with the fact that there should be every effort to achieve the 

goal of simplicity, I am also concerned that we don't go to the extreme 

and not give us the tools to assure that students who have legitimate 

financial need are not addressed. So, I want to make sure that we do 

not set up a situation of major loopholes that will allow people to 

drive literally trucks through. 

Thank you very much. 

MR. BERGERON: Thank you, Ronald. Dan, you got any questions? 

MR. MADZELAN: No. 

MR. BERGERON: Elaine Mozena. Did I get that anywhere near right? 

53 
MS. MOZENA: That's close-as close-- 

MR. BERGERON: Mozena. Thank you. 

MS. MOZENA: Thank you for the opportunity to speak. I am Elaine 

Mozena from California State University, Northridge, and I am the 

University Collection Officer. And I was just seeking some 

clarification that perhaps you can do during this process on Section 

430 under loan forgiveness for service in areas of national need. They 

have one of the qualifications for forgiveness being a--highly 

qualified teachers, and I think it would be very helpful if there was a 

deeper definition of highly qualified teachers. 

Also, national service, I think, needs to be clarified, as well 

as public sector employees, because I know when we get into discussions 

with our former students on cancelations, there will be those that 

could be just a clerk, could be a janitor--it could be any segment. And 

without a real defined definition, they may think they may qualify 

under this guidance here. 

That's all I have. Thank you. 

MR. BERGERON: Okay. I think we have a fairly extensive definition 

of "highly qualified teacher" that we use in the teacher loan 

forgiveness program that we currently have in FFEL and Direct Loans, 

and that's derived largely from No Child Left Behind--so I think that, 

in that area, there's actually quite a bit of guidance that we've 

already provided. Could you speak a little bit more about your concern 

about public sector employee. 

MS. MOZENA: Well, a lot of times, as I said, there will be people 

that--we had cases where someone's just a clerk in the IRS, as an 

example, and they think that they can qualify for a forgiveness. So, 

sometimes just working in a department, they think that they qualify, 

and I don't know how you can narrow it down, but it might be helpful if 

we had a little bit more specification on exactly who would qualify 

under that public sector. 

MR. BERGERON: So, your concern is that we attempt to narrow it or 

define it in such a way that it's easy to identify who those 

individuals are. 

MS. MOZENA: Right, especially when they get their form and it's 

like they think that they can qualify, and they can't. 

MR. BERGERON: Thank you. 

MS. MOZENA: Thank you. 

54 
MR. BERGERON: I do not know that we have anyone else who has 

signed up to speak at this point. So, what we're going to do is adjourn 

to reconvene at 1:45. Thank you--recess until 1:45. We'll recess. 

[Brief recess.] 

 MR. BERGERON: Good afternoon. We're going to go ahead and 

resume the hearing. Catherine Jackson is the next person to come and 

speak to us. Good afternoon. 

DR. JACKSON: I'm going to adjust a little bit upward. 

MR. BERGERON: Yes, the last person was a little shorter than... 

DR. JACKSON: Yes, I wasn't thinking I was that tall, so--well, 

it's nice to be here. As you just heard, my name is Catherine Jackson, 

Dr. Catherine Jackson. I've been a speech language pathologist for over 

30 years. I'm currently an Associate Professor at California State 

University, Northridge in the Department of Communication Disorders, 

and Sciences, and that's the academic field for speech language 

pathology and audiology. I'd like to speak to you on behalf of the 

national organization which governs and supports speech language 

pathologists and audiologists, and that organization is called ASHA, 

the American Speech Language Hearing Association. And you're nodding 

yes, I see. You've heard of it. Even more importantly than speaking on 

behalf of ASHA and my university, I'd also like to speak to you on 

behalf of my graduate students. So, in our field of speech language 

pathology and audiology, universities prepare our students to work in a 

variety of settings: private practice, medical settings, and also 

educational settings. Here in California, in the San Fernando Valley, 

which is where CSUN, Cal State University of Northridge, is, I see 

enormous potential in our students to address a big issue in education, 

which is the chronic shortage of trained professionals in communication 

disorders and sciences. I'm going to take a moment to tell you about 

some of the characteristics of our undergraduate and graduate students 

since the terminal degree for us is a graduate degree. At CSUN, our 

students are typically multilingual, they're from a variety of 

cultures. Many of them are starting out as post-baccalaureate students, 

so they come from a variety of other fields with a desire to do--work 

in a field of service. They're uniformly, unbelievably excited about 

speech language pathology and audiology, and most of our students want 

55 
to work either partly or entirely with students--with children, even 

though they also might want to work with some adults. When I watch 

these students progress throughout their program, I notice that it's 

not an easy path for them. Their path appears to others contemplating 

this field difficult and at times unattractive for a variety of 

reasons. One is that they take out extensive loans to fund their 

graduate education. Another is that they also at the same time work 

throughout graduate school. And those two factors combined serve to 

protract the course of their education, so that it takes them longer to 

achieve their degree. And then, as they start their career, they're 

faced with the burden of loans, and it is not as if they are training 

in a field where they will be rewarded with extensive financial 

results. Now, despite these negative factors, our students persevere. 

We graduate 72-75 master students each year, a pretty substantial 

number for one university in addressing the shortage. Many of our best 

students state that they are not considering employment in the schools 

upon their graduation. Well, what makes this public school position 

unattractive to them? Primarily, they cite the enormous and 

overwhelming caseloads caused by the shortage of speech language 

pathologists in the state, but also everywhere else. They understand, 

because of the shortage, they will not be able to--they will be 

shortchanging their students. They've also spoken to those of us who 

are already out in the field in the public school setting and who are 

burned out and have gone into private practice or into a medical 

setting of some sort, anywhere where they feel they can actually do 

their job and have some kind of impact. 

I'm going to tell you about an incident yesterday, when I spoke 

to a group of graduate students. This was a group of ten graduate 

students in a very intimate clinical class, and we spent a lot of time 

together. I took an informal poll. First, I asked how many of them were 

hoping to work with children. Out of the--actually it was eleven 

graduate students--ten out of the eleven said that they wanted to work 

some or all of their practice--have that be with children. 

So, then I talked with them and familiarized them with the Higher 

Education Opportunity Act, and I outlined the work of the amendment 

committee in including speech language pathology and audiology students 

in the loan forgiveness program. Two additional students indicated 

that, if this was funded, that that might change their focus to public 

56 
school practice. So, now we're to--out of the eleven, we have three 

that are considering public schools. All of them were disappointed--and 

our students don't fail to express themselves when they're 

disappointed--that there was, currently, no funding mechanism set 

aside. I elaborated further. I told them, if speech language 

pathologists and audiologists were included in Title II funding, they 

would have access to funds to continue their education and their 

training to maintain their skills and their national certification. 

At this point, I had their full attention. They were beginning to 

realize the full benefits of the Higher Education Opportunity Act, the 

possibility of taking out more loans, completing their education in a 

more timely fashion, because they would be able to work less and take 

more courses every semester, knowing that their employment in the 

schools would allow them to participate in loan forgiveness, the 

financial incentive of the continuing education benefit under Title II 

once they were out in the community, and, finally, the potential 

increase in the total number of specialists, then, who would be 

attracted to the public schools, making their caseload and their work 

more manageable. All these things together, I think, would make public 

school employment much more attractive: smaller caseloads, fewer 

lawsuits by families who had been underserved by the SLP shortage, and 

children who got the appropriate services. At this point, eight of the 

eleven said, under those conditions, they would consider working in the 

public schools. It is clear to me, at least, that the Higher Education 

Opportunity Act can make a difference in the availability of the SLPs 

in the school, it could decrease time to graduation and encourage more 

students to enter the profession and to enter the public school 

educational team. Ultimately, it seems it could address the current 

crisis of the unavailability of speech language pathologists in 

California and elsewhere, and because of that, I think we need to do 

everything possible to provide speech language and audiology services 

for--to provide the opportunities inherent in the Higher Education 

Opportunity Act. I want to thank you for allowing me to state some of 

the current concerns that faculty members at a university level and 

also that students have. This is a field that attracts people that are 

very passionate about our work, and I have had a passion for this field 

and for the work that we do for more than three decades, kind of a long 

time. I support any effort to continue to supply the Nation with 

57 
specialists who can carry on our work, and it seems clear to me that 

the tripartite effects of the Higher Education Opportunity Act would 

allow us to do so. It would allow--it would, to summarize, allow 

inclusion of our field in Title II funding, it would allow loan 

forgiveness, and it--if we continued with the current statutory 

requirements required for accreditation, just be an enormous step 

towards ensuring the availability of speech language pathology and 

audiology services in our public schools. 

Thank you. 

MR. BERGERON: Thank you. Janice Woolsey. 

MS. WOOLSEY: I'm short. 

MR. BERGERON: Good afternoon. 

MS. WOOLSEY: Hello. My name is Janice Woolsey. I'm the Clinic 

Coordinator and an instructor in the Department of Communication 

Disorders and Sciences at Cal State Northridge. I want to thank you for 

giving me this opportunity to address the Committee. I've also 

submitted my comments in writing at the front for you. 

MR. BERGERON: Thank you. 

MS. WOOLSEY: And I'd like to convey to you the feedback from 

those I represent, so let me tell you who I represent: the speech 

pathology training programs and the students in fourteen public and 

private universities in the State of California. I sit on the board of 

the governing body for all of our universities, and also the members of 

the American Speech Language and Hearing Association. I also speak to 

you today as the Commissioner of Publications and Research for the 

California Speech Language Hearing Association. I wear many hats. I 

reviewed the Higher Education Opportunity Act as it was signed into law 

this past August. I want to extend to you my great appreciation and 

that of our students to the amendments committee for including speech 

pathology students in loan forgiveness. 

Here in California, we have been experiencing a shortage of 

speech pathologists in the schools for several years. There are school 

districts in our state who have been assigned court monitors now to 

assist with implementing IEPs for children in need of speech pathology. 

One such district here in Southern California reported that more than 

2,000 school children missed speech pathology services, IEP-mandated 

speech pathology services, this past year due to a shortage of 

qualified practitioners; that's a tremendous number of children not 

58 
served. We're also experiencing retirement in large numbers. When I 

read the statistic that almost half of all school-based speech 

pathologists will be eligible for retirement in 2017, I'm both shocked 

and saddened. This represents a huge brain-drain. 

The experienced personnel from whom our graduates could learn are 

leaving at a huge rate. But since we can't slow down the clock, I know 

that, since this fact is inevitable, we need to plan ahead. Our task 

now is to plan to fill every position before it becomes vacant. I see 

no way to do this without such enticements as loan forgiveness. The 

cost of higher education increases every year. I'm putting two 

daughters through college, so I'm also aware of the tuition cost, and 

the length of our programs continues to grow as new knowledge and skill 

areas are added to our basic curriculum requirements. In our clinical 

training programs, we prepare students to work in the schools, offering 

them the required coursework, and the onsite public school-based 

training that they need to become credentialed in this state. I believe 

this extra enticement of loan forgiveness would be all that many of our 

students would need to choose school-based speech pathology or 

audiology careers over private or medical settings, as Catherine has 

mentioned. It's my understanding that the authorization to include 

speech pathology and audiology students is only step one, now the 

authorization has to be funded. I respectfully request that funds be 

appropriated for the benefit of speech pathology and audiology students 

who wish to commit to working in the schools, and I invite you to call 

upon me and my university colleagues here in California to help or 

advise you in any capacity needed. 

Secondly, I would like to speak to you briefly about the 

accreditation process. Our national organization, ASHA, has requested 

that the accreditation statute be left alone. ASHA and its members 

support the current statutory requirements related to accreditation, 

and respectfully request that the Department of Education not include 

changes to the speech pathology and audiology accreditation process in 

this round of negotiated rulemaking. The fields of speech pathology and 

audiology are complicated. ASHA has standards that they've set for 

minimum competencies for any university program across this country. 

So, there are approximately 240 minimum competencies for--each--for 

speech pathology and audiology. This carefully thought-through process 

for universities to certify the minimum competency of every student 

59 
coming through the program is designed to ensure that the students 

demonstrate entry-level academic knowledge and clinical skills in all 

general areas of the field. This prepares them for their clinical 

fellowships in a variety of settings: school-based, hospital-based, 

medical-based, and private practice. A new speech pathology master's 

graduate entering the schools from an ASHA-accredited university 

program would be prepared to see school children with disorders ranging 

from articulation and phonological process disorders, fluency or 

stuttering disorders, vocal pathology and resonance disorders 

associated with cleft lip and pallet, language delays, language 

disorders--including those associated with autism--pragmatic and social 

aspects of communication, cognitive linguistic deficits, those in need 

of augmentative or alternative communication devices, and those who 

exhibit swallowing disorders. These are all listed in the minimal 

competencies in our ASHA accreditation already. 

Our field is also designed so that the new graduates continue 

their training for the first nine months of full-time work in our 

field; it's a formalized mentor-mentee relationship with an experienced 

speech pathologist or audiologist. This ensures the quality of our 

providers, and with this formal system in place, ASHA feels and I agree 

that accreditation should not be considered in negotiated rulemaking at 

this time. We like it the way it is. Ensuring the quality of our 

providers brings me to my third and final point. I would like to 

request that school-based speech pathologists and audiologists be 

included in Title II, thus affording them access to professional 

preparation funds. Continuing education and training are the hallmarks 

of great professionals. Some fields like ours mandate a minimum number 

of hours of training each year to update knowledge and skills. I would 

also like to submit for consideration that this is an excellent 

recruitment and retention tool to entice graduate students into schoolbased speech pathology and audiology careers at a time when hospitals 

and other medical sites are cutting back or eliminating funds for 

continuing education while ASHA and many individual state license 

boards have mandated them. Inclusion in Title II and appropriation of 

funds for continuing education would bring more speech pathologists and 

audiologists into school-based practice, and it would keep them there 

as well. 

60 
Attendance is increasing each year at our national and state 

conventions, as well as the ASHA speech pathologists in the schools 

convention. All of these conventions provide continuing education 

opportunities, which is usually the only reason people attend. I'm also 

a continuing education administrator for ASHA, so I am involved in many 

of these educational opportunities. I often hear our new grads say that 

they cannot afford to go to continuing education, but they are 

precisely the ones that we should be reaching and who should be taking 

advantage of this. Why can't they go? Many of them are still paying off 

their loans. So, this would also benefit--the students would also 

benefit from networking and knowledge sharing that goes on at such 

convention events. But let's not forget the more seasoned speech 

pathologists and audiologists in the schools. Retention of our 

experienced professionals may hinge on inclusion of Title II funding as 

well. Private practices can lure them away, and sometimes they lure the 

best and the brightest away with promises of continuing education 

funding. More important, for the benefit of the children served, these 

experienced professionals should be funded so they can learn the 

newest, the latest, and the best practices that, combined with their 

experience and working knowledge of school-based issues is what will 

make them great mentors. Financial assistance. Inclusion of speech 

pathologists and audiologists in Title II funding for attendance as 

such educational opportunities could only increase the pool of bettertrained, more up-to-date speech pathologists and audiologists providing 

services to children. And I want to thank you for this opportunity to 

speak for you on a topic for which I too have a lot of passion. And 

again, if there's anything I can do to help you with this process, I'm 

happy to help. I wish you a good afternoon, and have a safe trip. 

MR. BERGERON: Thank you, Janice. I think we may be at another 

break. If anyone is in the room and wishes to speak and hasn't signed 

up yet with Donald or Jessica in the back, please do that. Otherwise, 

we will wait and see if anyone else is available--wants to come forward 

and testify. Thank you. 

[Recess.] 

MR. BERGERON: We'll go ahead and reconvene. Our next person 

coming to speak to us is Jesse Melgar. Hi, Jesse. 

61 
MR. MELGAR: How's it going? 

MR. BERGERON: Great. 

MR. MELGAR: First of all, I'd like to thank you all for coming 

out to the LA area; it's very convenient for me. My name is Jesse 

Melgar. I'm a fourth-year political science and Chicano Studies student 

at UCLA, and I'm also the Undergraduate Student Association Council 

External Vice President. What that means is my office does a lot of 

work with advocacy, specifically in regards to higher education within 

the UC and beyond. This year, I currently serve as the Chairman of the 

University of California Student Association Board of Directors. I know 

this is a lot. I'm trying to slow it down for you all--and UCSA is a 

coalition of student governments. Every UC belongs to the coalition, 

both grad, undergrad, and professional students, and we're here today 

to talk a little bit about--well, I'm here today to represent the over 

200,000 students that we represent within UCSA and talk a little bit 

about the Higher Education Act. So, thank you all for having me. 

I'll begin with a little bit more about myself, and kind of why 

this bill is relevant to me. I am--like I said, I'm going into my 

fourth year at UCLA. I'm a first generation college student. I receive 

a Pell Grant. I am under work study. So, I'm also largely affected by a 

lot of the issues being presented today. UCSA is in coalition with the 

United States Students Association, so I know there are about five 

hearings or so, if I'm correct, going on throughout the country, and we 

have students, you know, hopefully attending each of those meetings. 

And then, USSA, just so you all know--have a little more background--is 

a coalition of state student associations--so, whether it be student 

government or different student organizations 

So, with that, I just wanted to talk to you all about some 

questions I had, and I'll address the Board and let you all know the 

questions that I have coming forward--but I do want to start with 

saying we're really excited about the reauthorization of the Higher 

Education Act. Obviously, in representing students--a lot of the 

students we do represent come from low-income communities and are, you 

know, receiving financial aid in the form of, at the state level, Cal 

Grants, and then, at the national level, Pell Grants and work study, as 

I mentioned--not to mention Perkins Loans. So, a few things I just 

wanted to bring up, first of which was the--in reading over the--in 

reading over the language of the Higher Education and Reauthorization 

62 
Act--and please correct me if I'm wrong in my interpretation--but I 

read a portion that mentioned that students are eligible to receive up 

to two Pell Grants in a single academic year, and I was just a little 

unclear as to whether or not that means that they are eligible for a 

Pell Grant when they enter their fall quarter or semester depending on 

the school's academic calendar, or if that means that they would be 

receiving it fall--per semester, and if we're on quarter systems, how 

that would work--and then, also, if they would be eligible to receive 

an award during the summer semester or session. 

MR. MADZELAN: Here's the easy way to think about that. You are an 

undergraduate. You go to school for four years, you get four Pell 

Grants. Under previous law, say you accelerated your program so that 

you finished in three years. So, you did four years' of work in three 

years, you would get three years' worth of Pell Grants, even though 

you've essentially incurred four years' worth of cost--right?--but 

you've just accelerated-- 

MR. MELGAR: Correct. 

MR. MADZELAN: The notion here is that, if you finish your--you 

accelerate and you finish your program in three years, you get four 

Pell Grants. So, again, just that--the notion is, if you accelerate 

your program, we'll help you with the same funding level that you would 

have gotten had you not accelerated your program. 

MR. MELGAR: Okay. 

MR. MADZELAN: That's the basic idea. 

MR. MELGAR: So, now, if the students aren't aware that they're 

going to be graduating in three years and they graduate their third 

year, how will they receive that compensation for funding in the fourth 

year they will not be attending? 

MR. MADZELAN: Well, because they would have gotten, you know, 

the grant money previously. I know you're on a quarter system, but it's 

perhaps a little bit easier to think about it in a semester. So, right 

now, if you went fall and spring, two semesters, you get a Pell Grant. 

You come back in the summer for a full summer term, maybe you could get 

a Pell Grant, but it would count against next year. Again, the notion 

here is that you'd get your one-half of Pell Grant for the fall, one 

half-year Pell Grant for the spring, and another half for the summer. 

So, actually, you get one-and-a-half Pell Grants within one year. 

So, again, if you do that three times, essentially you've gotten the 

63 
same amount of Pell Grant money that you would have gotten over four 

years. So, it doesn't require you to go around to attend year-round for 

your whole college career, but if you do that, for example, in one or 

two years, you'll get the extra Pell Grant money. 

MR. MELGAR: Okay. Thank you for clarifying that. 

MR. MADZELAN: That's the concept. 

MR. MELGAR: Thank you. Thank you for clarifying that. Just a few 

other questions. I know that there's a potential to expand the work 

study options. I just wanted to know if you all had any idea about what 

that means for students as far as--and again, please correct if I'm 

reading this wrong; I saw your facial expression--expand to jobs that 

are under different criteria. What exactly is meant by expanding work 

study options? Does that mean beyond just the campus level into, like, 

community organizations, because I believe, currently, at least at 

UCLA, work study is only operational at the university? 

MR. MADZELAN: Yeah, it's the--the notion there is--and the new 

language is not an absolute requirement, and you know, that's partly 

because the existing language is not an absolute requirement. The 

notion is that, to the extent practicable, colleges and universities 

should place their work study students in jobs that have some 

connection to or relevance for their academic or career aspirations. 

You know, that's a laudable goal, but there's only so many jobs out 

there in particular areas. So, what the Congress has said in this 

Reauthorization is that, in addition to what we the Congress have 

always said, colleges and universities should make an effort to find 

work study employment in positions that enhance or expand a student's 

understanding of civic involvement--that kind of thing. So, again, 

it's--as we say, it's not a hard requirement, but rather a program 

purpose or objective that colleges and universities ought to ascribe 

to. 

MR. MELGAR: Okay. Thank you for clarifying that. And this is the 

last question: I know that there's a mention of public service loan 

forgiveness programs and expanding that, and I'm just curious as to how 

that will be implemented and which fields of public service will be 

affected by the loan forgiveness program that's being proposed. 

MR. BERGERON: Well, it's not a program that's been proposed; it's 

a program that's been enacted, but it is subject to appropriations. So, 

Congress has to appropriate money for these loan forgiveness programs. 

64 
There is an existing public service loan forgiveness program 

within the Higher Education Act that was added, I think, under the 

College Cost Reduction and Access Act, for Direct Loans only, where the 

loans can be forgiven after ten years of repayment under income-based 

or income-contingent repayment or under the ten-year standard plan. So, 

that last one gets a little tricky, because it's unclear to me what's 

left after ten years of paying on a ten-year plan. But in the new law--

and I don't remember all the categories off the top of my head--I think 

there were 20 or so. 

MR. MADZELAN: Sixteen. 

MR. BERGERON: Sixteen new categories. They range from the speech 

pathologists and audiologists that work in schools--I had this open 

before. 

MR. MELGAR: I'm sorry. These sixteen new categories being added 

after-- 

MR. MADZELAN: New explicit categories. 

MR. BERGERON: New explicit categories. So, they are early 

childhood educators, foreign language specialists, librarians, highly 

qualified teachers serving students who are limited English-proficient, 

low-income communities, under-represented populations, child welfare 

workers, speech language pathologists and audiologists, school 

counselors, public service employees, nutrition professionals, STEM 

employees, physical therapists, superintendents, principals, and other 

administrators in schools, and occupational therapists. 

MR. MADZELAN: The important thing to keep in mind here is that 

everything that David just mentioned--these are new forgiveness 

programs, but they require Congress to provide an appropriation. That 

is different from the existing forgiveness programs we have chiefly for 

teachers, which--you know, back in Washington, we call these mandatory 

programs, meaning that, if you, Jesse, meet the statutory eligibility 

requirements, you get the benefit, as opposed to under these new 

programs--you know, you, Jesse, may meet the requirement, but if 

Congress hasn't appropriated the money--you know, you've met the 

requirement. I mean--so, that's a very important distinction. 

And so, if Congress does appropriate the money, that would be a 

fixed pot. And so, yes, you, Jesse--you meet the qualifications, the 

eligibility requirements for this loan forgiveness, but you better be a 

little bit closer to the front of the line-- 

65 
MR. MELGAR: Right. 

MR. MADZELAN: --than the rear, because the money will run out. 

MR. MELGAR: How often does Congress appropriate? Is it on an 

annual basis? 

MR. MADZELAN: Annual basis, yes. 

MR. MELGAR: Okay. 

MR. MADZELAN: And so, these are--as we said, these are super 

brand-new programs, unlikely to be funded in the '09 appropriation--our 

fiscal '09 year just started. We have some--yeah, today--yesterday. 

MR. BERGERON: Yesterday. 

MR. MADZELAN: Yesterday. Today's the second. 

And so, we're under some special rule at the moment, again, back 

in Washington. So, conceivably and realistically, the earliest that 

funding could occur would be for Fiscal '10, which is the year that 

starts October 1, 2009. 

MR. MELGAR: Okay. That was, actually--those are the three 

questions that I wanted to bring up. Again, I do thank you all for 

coming out here. As I said, I'm a Bruin down the street, so it's really 

convenient. If I want to find--because I know the language is really 

complex and I'm sure you all are familiar with it, but for people like 

me and students who want to learn more about the issues, where can you 

direct us, or do there exist fact sheets that we can just have that, 

like, outline the changes the from the previous reauthorization to this 

year. 

MR. BERGERON: Excellent that you asked, because at some point 

before I closed the hearing, I had to get the plug for the Web site in. 

MR. MELGAR: Okay. 

MR. BERGERON: We're posting all of our information on the 

provisions of the Higher Education Opportunity Act at a Web site, which 

is really easy to find. The Department's general Web site is 

WWW.ED.GOV, and if you add a slash after our normal customary Web site 

address, URL you type in HEOA, and that's where it will take you to all 

of the materials to the Higher Education Opportunity Act. We intend to 

post the--a "dear colleague" letter on that site as soon as it's 

available. I know the actual text of the public law probably will be 

posted--maybe today, maybe tomorrow. 

66 
MR. MADZELAN: But the--your question has given us an opportunity 

to do a little show and tell, which is--you've been reading, basically, 

this, the conference report-- 

MR. MELGAR: Right. 

MR. MADZELAN: --which is amendatory language, which is useful 

when the Congress writes a brand-new provision, but when they are 

amending existing language, it's hard to follow. That's why you need 

the compilation of the Higher Education Act, and the last time the 

Congress actually printed this, you can gather by my well-worn copy-- 

MR. MELGAR: I take it I can't go to Barnes & Noble and pick one 

up. 

MR. MADZELAN: Exactly. It was 1999; is that right? 

MR. BERGERON: Yes. 

MR. MADZELAN: 1999. We anticipate the Congress will authorize 

publication of another compilation that would include the 2008 

amendments. 

MR. MELGAR: Okay. 

MR. MADZELAN: We are--because we deal with this stuff everyday 

over here--that we can't wait for that to happen, just to have, you 

know, the full amended language in one sort of--I won't say easy to 

read-- 

MR. MELGAR: Right. 

MR. MADZELAN: --but certainly convenient package. 

MR. MELGAR: So, on the Web site you gave me, then, is there a--I 

guess what I'm looking for is for someone who doesn't have the time to 

read through everything in that novel of a bill. Is there something 

that outlines, really, like, things that have changed? And if not, 

like--if I were to recommend to you all on the Web site--you could just 

outline--the previous bill includes this. This is what's being proposed 

that's changing--just because it's a lot easier to follow, at least for 

students who I've spoken to. 

MR. BERGERON: What we will be releasing is a "dear colleague" 

letter that summarizes in plain language-- 

MR. MELGAR: Okay. 

MR. BERGERON: --as close to plain language as we can, the change-

-what has changed in the bill. 

MR. MELGAR: Okay. Okay. All right, well, thank you gentlemen for 

your time. I really appreciate it. 

67 
MR. BERGERON: Thank you. 

MR. MADZELAN: Thank you. 

MR. BERGERON: Jesse, Harold has reminded us of another resource, 

the Congressional Research Service, which is a body in Congress--has 

posted on their Web site, not ours, on September 8th, a summary of the 

bill--Congressional Research Service. 

MR. MELGAR: Thank you. 

MR. BERGERON: Thank you, Harold. 

 Thank you, Jesse. 

[Recess.] 

MR. BERGERON: It is now 4:00 and we will be adjourning this 

hearing. Our next hearing will be in Washington, D.C. on October 8th. 

Thank you all for coming. 

[Whereupon, at 4:00 p.m., the hearing was adjourned.] 

68