Date: 2003-11-19
Speaker: GEORGE MILLER (democrat)
Chamber: H
State: California

Mr. Speaker. I thank the gentleman from Michigan for bringIng this motion and giving us an opportunity not only to speak on this isnue but also to hopefully persuade the conferees to do as we suggest in his motion. and that is to seek an overall funding level of at least 14.3 million for student aid and the highest possible level for the Pell grant program. Today we are faced with the critical need to expand opportunities for lowand middleincome students to access college education. Too many students are forced to take on high loan debt. work long hours. and forgo college all together. Typical middleincome students face a $3.000ayear unmet need after all grants. loans. and work study. while the typical lowincome student faces an unmet need of some $3.800. For millions of laidoff American workers. additional education training is the key to successfully reentering the workforce. Without additional student aid. these workers will remain jobless for a longer period of time than necessary. or they may remain jobless for a very. very long time because of failure to adapt their skills to the changing marketplace. In California. alone. more than half a million students workers who were retained rely on the Pell grants to attend college. Today the average Poll grant of $2.415 is worth approximately $50 less in real ternis than It was almost 30 years ago. And that is the reason we are asking to hopefully honor these higher levels of the Housepassed legislation. Poll grants now represent just 11 percent of all student aid compared to Federal loans. which represent 45 percent of all student aid. Thirty years ago. the two major grant programs. Pell and the supplemental education opportunity grants. accounted for more than 40 percent of all student aid. Today. they account for less than 20 percent. Just as a higher education and stu(lent aid has become more important to our national security and economic prosperity. President Bush called on them to cut the maximum Pell grant. and the Republican 2004 LaborHHS freezes the maximum Pell grant at $4.050. In addition. the Republican 2004 LaborHHS bill slashes the Bush administrations overall Pell budget request by $465 million. We should support. and not oppose. efforts to meet our critical national. economic. and security needs. Yet the Republican 2004 LaborHHS bill not only fails to meet those needs but also fails to meet the needs of current and future college students. I urge my colleagues to vote "yes" on the Kildee motion to support these higher levels of funding. and I would say to my friend and colleague from Ohio . the chairman of the subcommittee. that we would like to share a little credit for those increases in Pells since we had a Democratic President a number of those years. We had a Democratic Senate. and we would like to think we participated in that effort. What troubles us is the -righthand edge of that chart where it is topping out. It is sort of hitting a plateau and kind of running along there without those increases. The gentleman has been a champion of education. I could not feel anymore comfortable than making the plea to him because I spent many hours with him on elementary and secondary education and higher education. and all of the issues that confront these institutions. and we have tried. I think. in our best wisdom to try and improve those institutions. Clearly. we are now seeing part of it is the turmoil in the economy. part of it is the turmoil in State budgets. but students are not able to put together the financial wherewithal. and especially lowincome students are starting not to apply to colleges and universities. and we know that we need them to do this. The gentleman and I have sat through numerous conferences where they have now made clearly the determination in the employer community that what the student needs for entry level jobs. if that job is in any way going to lead to a career. they need the same set of skills. talent. and education one would receive in an AA degree. as they would just for entry level. but for many students. especially those from lowincome communities. that means that they have got to have some financial assistance for those 2 years of college as they try to acquire those skills. Should they desire to go on. obviously the burden gets greater. So I guess we do not feel that this is falling on deaf ears with the chairman because he has been a champion. We are hoping. and I think he started in the omnibus appropriations bill this evening the negotiation and maybe the LaborHHS bill ends up in that appropriations. We are hoping that as all of those figures are moved around and those decisions are made that this is sort of our last plea to try and meet these numbers so that we can attend to the problems of lowincome students who have worked hard in high school. become eligible to go on to community college. to 4year colleges. to universities and that the financial support system is what really stands in their way. We would hope that when we vote on the Kildee motion. I guess we will vote tomorrow. we would hope that it would be overwhelmingly in support of that motion and that message would be carried into the appropriations deliberations over the next couple of days and over the weekend. if necessary. in order to hammer out a budget that we could all support for Pell grants and for student aid. I want to thank the gentleman who has been Involved so many years in higher education. on the authorizing committee. the gentleman from Michigan . for offering this motion. and we look forward to everyones support for this motion.