Today, Chairman Lamar Alexander (R-TN) and Ranking Member Patty Murray (D-WA) of the Senate Committee on Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions (HELP) released a bipartisan bill on the reauthorization of the Elementary and Secondary Education Act (ESEA). A summary of the bill, dubbed the Every Child Achieves Act, can be found here. The full bill can be found here.
Attendees of the 67th AACTE Annual Meeting in Atlanta were offered an opportunity to meet with a U.S. Department of Education official to discuss the Teacher Quality Partnership (TQP) grants and how they may explore applying for them in the future.
In a concurrent session presentation, Mia Howerton of the U.S. Department of Education Office of Innovation and Improvement provided attendees with an overview of the TQP grants and what the profile of a successful grantee applicant typically looks like. With the TQP program now in its third grant cycle, Howerton reviewed the successes and challenges of the program and shared its lessons with audience members.
TIME SENSITIVE: Responses due April 24, 2015
The U.S. Senate Committee on Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions (HELP) seeks input from the higher education community for its work on the reauthorization of the Higher Education Act (HEA). Your feedback is requested by April 24 in these areas:
Note: AACTE offered a free webinar to members March 25 and 26 about the next steps on the proposed regulations for teacher preparation programs. A recording of the webinar is available here.
Two new bills introduced in Congress seek to impede the U.S. Department of Education’s attempt to regulate teacher preparation programs. The Supporting Academic Freedom through Regulatory Relief Act (H.R. 970), introduced in the U.S. House of Representatives by Representative Virginia Foxx (R-NC), and its companion bill in the U.S. Senate, S. 559, introduced by Senator Richard Burr (R-NC), seek to achieve the following objectives:
Please join me next week for a free webinar on what you can do next regarding the proposed federal regulations for teacher preparation programs.
The public comment period through the Federal Register, which closed last month, was just one piece of ongoing advocacy and outreach necessary to ensure the voice of the profession is expressed to policy makers and key stakeholders as the regulation process unfolds. Learn of the next steps for you to take on the federal proposed teacher preparation regulations.
A recent report by the think tank Third Way claims that the federal Teacher Education Assistance for College and Higher Education (TEACH) grant program is failing to meet its aims, instead burdening nearly 40% of recipients to date with converted unsubsidized loans after they failed to complete all program requirements.
The report calls for changes to the program, either through “short-term fixes” such as reducing reporting requirements and limiting grant use to “high-performing” programs (as proposed in the new federal regulations for teacher preparation programs) or, preferably, in a thorough overhaul that streamlines all federal assistance for teachers into a simple loan-forgiveness program.
With an intention of generating 100,000 comments to the U.S. Department of Education on its proposed regulations for teacher preparation programs, the members of the AACTE Committee on Government Relations and Advocacy are leading the charge with a Twitter campaign to spread awareness of the proposed regulations.
Remember, the deadline to comment is February 2, and the teacher preparation profession’s voice must be heard! (See AACTE’s regulations web page for more information.)
Please join our Twitter campaign at #EDregs to help us reach out to colleagues, public officials, students, organizations, and the public to help generate more conversation on Twitter about the regulations—leading, we hope, to more comments submitted to the government.
On Friday, January 2, AACTE submitted formal comments to the U.S. Office of Management and Budget (OMB) regarding the burden and cost estimates that were provided in the proposed federal teacher preparation regulations. The extensive 38-page analysis echoes many of the concerns raised by AACTE members and colleague organizations.
On Tuesday, December 16, President Obama signed into law H.R. 83, the Consolidated and Further Continuing Appropriations Act, 2015, which distributes $1.1 trillion across the federal government.
U.S. Department of Education discretionary funding was cut by $166 million. The Teacher Quality Partnership program took only a small hit, reducing funding to around $40 million. We are grateful to our champions on the Hill, including Senator Jack Reed (D-RI), for the continued funding of this program.
As you may know, embedded in the teacher preparation program regulations proposed by the U.S. Department of Education is a request for feedback from the Office of Management and Budget (OMB) concerning the cost estimates and burden estimates of the proposed information collection. AACTE encourages you to respond to this request.
The deadline for the OMB request is January 2, 2015. Please note this deadline is a month earlier than the deadline to comment on the overall regulations.
The proposed federal regulations for teacher preparation programs are now officially open for public comment. AACTE is carefully reviewing the regulations and encourages others to do the same during the 60-day comment period, which closes February 2, 2015.
We will be producing various resources for AACTE members and posting updates on our web site as they become available. Be sure to read Sharon Robinson’s initial statement on the regulations in the meantime, and contact us at regs@aacte.org with any questions or other feedback.
Late yesterday afternoon, U.S. Secretary of Education Arne Duncan held a press conference to announce the release of proposed federal regulations for teacher preparation programs. While the regulations are not yet open for public comment through the Federal Register, the draft language is now available on the Department of Education’s web site.
AACTE is thrilled that the U.S. Department of Education last week announced the awarding of a new round of Teacher Quality Partnership (TQP) grants, the federal government’s only investment in reforming teacher preparation. With grants totaling more than $35 million to 24 partnerships in the first year alone, these awards will assist to recruit, train, and support more than 11,000 educators in the science, technology, engineering, and math (STEM) fields.
AACTE is pleased by the administration’s recognition of the value of continued federal investment in higher education-based teacher preparation programs. Many AACTE member institutions have benefited from TQP funding since the program’s inception in 2009, and the new round of grants expands the reach to more institutions and their partner schools.
It’s an election year – the full U.S. House of Representatives and one third of the U.S. Senate are up for re-election – which makes for interesting legislative times. Elections are just 4 months out, and we have about 7 legislative weeks left in the 113th Congress.
The primary season has essentially ended, and we’ve seen some shockers – including Majority Leader Eric Cantor (R-VA) losing his primary election and subsequently resigning his leadership position. As we approach the August recess and fall election season, some important work is under way in both the House and the Senate.
Updated to reflect new application deadline.
Applications are now available for a new slate of Teacher Quality Partnership (TQP) grants, the federal government’s only investment in reforming teacher preparation in institutions of higher education. Interested applicants will have to act quickly, though—the deadline for letters of intent is June 27, and full applications are due July 15.
Last week, in the Federal Register, the U.S. Department of Education (ED) announced the availability of approximately $35 million in new awards for fiscal year 2014 under the TQP grant program.
