I 
109TH CONGRESS 
1ST SESSION H. R. 1282 
To provide for Project GRAD programs, and for other purposes. 
IN THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES 
MARCH 14, 2005 
Mrs. MCCARTHY (for herself and Ms. PRYCE of Ohio) introduced the following 
bill; which was referred to the Committee on Education and the Workforce 
A BILL 
To provide for Project GRAD programs, and for other 
purposes. 
Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representa-
tives of the United States of America in Congress assembled, 
SECTION 1. SHORT TITLE. 
This Act may be cited as the ‘‘Graduation Really 
Achieves Dreams Act’’ or the ‘‘GRAD Act’’. 
SEC. 2. FINDINGS. 
Congress makes the following findings: 
(1) The national secondary school graduation 
rate is only 70 percent. For the class of 2001, the 
national graduation rate was only 51 percent for Af-
rican-American students and 52 percent for Latino 
students. 
(2) In our nation’s high poverty urban districts, 
as few as one-third of students graduate from sec-
ondary school. In these places, completion rates 
among certain disadvantaged groups of students are 
often lower still. 
(3) In rural areas, where one-third of American 
students attend school, only 58.8 percent of students 
attend institutions of higher education, compared 
with 68.2 percent of American students from urban 
and suburban areas. 
(4) Each school day, approximately 3,000 sec-
ondary school students drop out of school. 
(5) The 6,000,000 secondary students who 
make up the lowest 25 percent in terms of achieve-
ment scores are 3.5 times more likely to drop out 
than students in the next highest quarter of aca-
demic achievement, and are 20 times more likely to 
drop out than high achieving students. 
(6) Approximately 25 percent of secondary 
school students are reading at ‘‘below basic’’ levels. 
The problem is even more severe for poor students 
of color. The average minority or low-income ninth
grader performs at only the fifth or sixth grade level 
in reading. 
(7) Achievement gaps persist across racial and 
socioeconomic lines in rural schools—there are 
2,500,000 poor children in rural areas, and the child 
poverty rate in some rural areas is 2 to 3 times the 
national average. 
(8) Recruiting and retaining good teachers is 
an enormous challenge in rural areas: the average 
salary in rural districts is 13.4 percent lower than 
in nonrural areas; and teachers often teach more 
than 1 subject, teach in poor working conditions, live 
far from colleges, have little access to training, and 
face geographic and social isolation. 
(9) Low graduation rates and college attend-
ance rates are evidence that, in the earlier grades, 
schools are not meeting the fundamental achieve-
ment needs of low-income, minority, and rural stu-
dents. 
(10) Even those students who do graduate from 
secondary schools and go on to college are struggling 
because they lack the basic skills to succeed. Ap-
proximately 40 percent of all 4-year college students 
take a remedial course and 63 percent of all commu-
nity college students are assigned to at least 1 reme-
dial course. 
(11) A small percentage of low-income students 
who manage to enter college are able to complete a 
degree. Of students from families in the bottom 20 
percent in terms of income who enter college, only 
27 percent go on to complete a 2- or 4-year college 
degree within 8 years. 
(12) Graduation rates impact early drop-out 
rates in the military. The attrition rates in the mili-
tary of both individuals who are not secondary 
school graduates and GED recipients are 8 percent-
age points higher than the attrition rate of sec-
ondary school graduates. As a result, the Armed 
Services no longer accepts secondary school dropouts 
and puts less value on alternative certificates. 
(13) Students who fail to graduate from sec-
ondary school are more likely to engage in criminal 
activity than students who graduate. A 1-percent in-
crease in secondary school graduation rates would 
save approximately $1,400,000,000 in costs associ-
ated with incarceration, or about $2,100 for each 
male secondary school graduate. 
(14) In today’s workplace, nearly 8 in 10 adults 
with baccalaureate degrees are employed, but for
those who completed secondary school only, the 
number falls to about 6 in 10. And for students who 
dropped out of secondary school, the number drops 
further to 4 in 10. 
(15) Employment projections indicate that jobs 
requiring only a secondary school degree will grow 
by just 9 percent by the year 2008, while those jobs 
requiring a bachelor’s degree will grow by 25 percent 
and those jobs requiring an associate’s degree will 
grow by 31 percent. 
(16) Personalization of the school environment 
has been proven to increase success rates for low- 
performing secondary school students. Nearly 50 
percent of middle school youth and 40 percent of 
secondary school youth report feelings of disengage-
ment from school. Rates are even higher for teens 
and minorities in urban schools. These feelings re-
sult in failure to work hard, to seek assistance, or 
to take appropriate courses. 
(17) Effective research-based education pro-
grams that improve secondary school graduation 
rates are comprehensive in nature and include inter-
ventions that begin in kindergarten or earlier and 
span all the grades through grade 12.
SEC. 3. PROJECT GRAD. 
(a) PURPOSES.—The purposes of this Act are— 
(1) to provide support and assistance to pro-
grams implementing integrated education reform 
services in order to improve secondary school grad-
uation and college attendance and completion rates 
for disadvantaged students; and 
(2) to promote the establishment of new pro-
grams to implement such integrated education re-
form services. 
(b) GRANT AUTHORIZED.—The Secretary is author-
ized to award a grant to Project GRAD USA (referred 
to in this Act as the ‘‘grantee’’), a nonprofit educational 
organization that has as its primary purpose the improve-
ment of secondary school graduation and college attend-
ance and completion rates for disadvantaged students, to 
implement and sustain the integrated education reform 
services described in subsection (d)(3) at existing Project 
GRAD program sites and to promote the expansion of 
such programs to new sites. 
(c) REQUIREMENTS OF GRANT AGREEMENT.—The 
Secretary shall enter into an agreement with the grantee 
that requires that the grantee shall— 
(1) enter into subcontracts with nonprofit edu-
cational organizations that serve a substantial num-
ber or percentage of low-income students (referred
to in this Act as ‘‘subcontractors’’), under which the 
subcontractors agree to implement the programs de-
scribed in subsection (d) and provide matching funds 
for such programs; 
(2) directly carry out— 
(A) activities to implement and sustain the 
literacy, mathematics, classroom management, 
social service, and college access programs fur-
ther described in subsection (d)(3); 
(B) activities to build the organizational 
and management capacity of the subcontractors 
to effectively implement and sustain the pro-
grams; 
(C) activities for the purpose of improving 
and expanding the programs, including but not 
limited to activities to further articulate a pro-
gram for one or more grade levels and across 
grade levels, to tailor a program for a particular 
target audience, and provide tighter integration 
across programs; 
(D) activities for the purpose of imple-
menting new Project GRAD program sites; 
(E) activities for the purpose of promoting 
greater public awareness of integrated edu-
cation reform services to improve secondary
school graduation and college attendance rates 
for disadvantaged students; and 
(F) other activities directly related to im-
proving secondary school graduation and college 
attendance and completion rates for disadvan-
taged students; and 
(3) use grant funds available under this act to 
pay— 
(A) the amount determined under sub-
section (f)(1); and 
(B) costs associated with carrying out the 
activities and providing the services, as provided 
in paragraph (2) of this subsection. 
(d) SUPPORTED PROGRAMS.— 
(1) DESIGNATION.—The subcontractor pro-
grams referred to in subsection (c)(1) shall be 
known as ‘‘Project GRAD programs’’. 
(2) FEEDER
PATTERNS.—Each subcontractor 
shall implement a Project GRAD program and shall, 
with the agreement of the grantee— 
(A) identify or establish not less than one 
‘‘feeder pattern’’ of public schools, where ‘‘feed-
er pattern’’ is defined as a high school and the 
elementary schools and middle schools that 
channel students into that high school; and
(B) provide the integrated educational re-
form services described in paragraph (3) at the 
identified feeder pattern or feeder patterns. 
(3) INTEGRATED
EDUCATION
REFORM
SERV-
ICES.—The services provided through a Project 
GRAD program may include— 
(A) research-based programs in reading, 
mathematics, and classroom management; and 
(B) campus-based social services programs, 
including a systematic approach to increase 
family and community involvement in the 
schools served by the Project GRAD program; 
(C) a college access program that in-
cludes— 
(i) providing college scholarships for 
students who meet established criteria; 
(ii) proven approaches for increasing 
student and family college awareness; and 
(iii) assistance for such students in 
applying for higher education financial aid; 
and 
(D) such other services identified by the 
grantee as necessary to increase secondary 
school graduation and college attendance and 
completion rates.
(e) USE OF FUNDS.—Of the funds made available 
under this Act, not more than 8 percent of such funds, 
or $4,000,000, whichever is less, shall be used by the 
grantee to pay for administration of the grant, with the 
remainder of funds to be used for the purposes described 
in subsections (c)(1) and (2). 
(f) GRANTEE CONTRIBUTION AND MATCHING RE-
QUIREMENT.— 
(1) IN GENERAL.—The grantee shall provide to 
each subcontractor an average of $200 for each 
pupil served by the subcontractor in the Project 
GRAD program, adjusted to take into consider-
ation— 
(A) the resources available in the area 
where the subcontractor will implement the 
Project GRAD program; and 
(B) the need for Project GRAD programs 
in such area to improve student outcomes. 
(2) MATCHING REQUIREMENT.—Each subcon-
tractor shall provide funds for the Project GRAD 
program in an amount that is equal to the amount 
received by the subcontractor from the grantee. 
Such matching funds may be provided in cash or in 
kind fairly evaluated.
(3) WAIVER
AUTHORITY.—The grantee may 
waive, in whole or in part, the requirement of sub-
section (f)(2) for a subcontractor, if the subcon-
tractor— 
(A) demonstrates that it would not other-
wise be able to participate in the program; and 
(B) enters into an agreement with the 
grantee with respect to the amount to which the 
waiver will apply. 
(4) DECREASE IN GRANTEE SHARE.—Based on 
the funds or resources available to a subcontractor, 
the grantee may elect to provide the subcontractor 
with an amount that is less than the amount deter-
mined under paragraph (1). 
(g) EVALUATION.— 
(1) EVALUATION
BY
THE
SECRETARY.—The 
Secretary shall select an independent entity to evalu-
ate, every 3 years, the performance of students who 
participate in a Project GRAD program under this 
Act. The evaluation shall— 
(A) be conducted using the strongest pos-
sible research design for determining the effec-
tiveness of the Project GRAD programs funded 
under this Act; and
(B) compare reading and mathematics 
achievement and, where applicable, the sec-
ondary school graduation, college attendance, 
and college completion rates of students who 
participate in a Project GRAD program funded 
under this Act with those indicators for stu-
dents of similar backgrounds who do not par-
ticipate in such programs. 
(2) EVALUATION
BY
GRANTEE
AND
SUB-
CONTRACTORS.— 
(A) IN GENERAL.—The grantee shall re-
quire each subcontractor to prepare an in-depth 
report of the results and the use of funds of 
each Project GRAD program funded under this 
Act that includes— 
(i) data on the reading and mathe-
matics achievement of students involved in 
the Project GRAD program; 
(ii) statistics on secondary school 
graduation, college attendance, and college 
completion rates; and 
(iii) such financial reporting as re-
quired by the Secretary to review the effec-
tiveness and efficiency of the program.
(B) FORM OF REPORT.—The report shall 
be in a form and include such content as shall 
be determined by the grantee, in consultation 
with the Secretary or the entity selected by the 
Secretary to evaluate the Project GRAD pro-
grams in accordance with paragraph (1). 
(3) AVAILABILITY OF EVALUATIONS.—Copies of 
any evaluation or report prepared under this sub-
section shall be made available to— 
(A) the Secretary; 
(B) the chairperson and ranking member 
of the Committee on Health, Education, Labor, 
and Pensions of the Senate; and 
(C) the chairperson and ranking member 
of the Committee on Education and the Work-
force of the House of Representatives. 
SEC. 4. DEFINITIONS. 
In this Act: 
(1) 
ELEMENTARY
SCHOOL; 
SECONDARY 
SCHOOL.—The terms ‘‘elementary school’’ and ‘‘sec-
ondary school’’ have the meanings given such terms 
in section 9101 of the Elementary and Secondary 
Education Act of 1965 (20 U.S.C. 7801). 
(2) LOW-INCOME STUDENT.—The term ‘‘low-in-
come student’’ means a student who is determined
by a local educational agency to be from a low-in-
come family using the measures described in section 
1113(a)(5) of the Elementary and Secondary Edu-
cation Act of 1965 (20 U.S.C. 6313(a)(5)). 
(3) SECRETARY.—The term ‘‘Secretary’’ means 
the Secretary of Education. 
SEC. 5. AUTHORIZATION OF APPROPRIATIONS. 
There are authorized to be appropriated to carry out 
this Act $27,000,000 for fiscal year 2006, and such sums 
as are necessary for each of the 5 succeeding fiscal years. 
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