HOUSE and SENATE

The House passed legislation embodying the deal (H.R. 3877) to raise the U.S.’s debt limit and increase the budget caps for Fiscal Years (FYs) 2020 and 2021 on a 284 to 149 vote. The bill would raise limits on non-defense discretionary spending by $24.5 billion and defense discretionary spending by $19.5 billion over FY2019 levels. The measure also includes $77 billion in savings to partially offset the additional spending authority and extends the Federal debt limit until July 31, 2021. It should be noted that, presently, there are not discretionary spending budget caps for FY2022 and beyond. Therefore, sequestration, as a result of exceeding discretionary budget caps, would not be triggered.

The House Education and Labor Committee released documents related to U.S. Department of Education (ED) Principal Deputy Undersecretary Diane Jones’ handling of Dream Center schools’ loss of accreditation and eventual closures.

ADMINISTRATION

ED announced that it will begin implementing the Obama-era State Authorization rule, retroactively taking effect on May 26, 2019. ED will publish an official notice of this action in the Federal Register on Monday, July 29.

The National Center for Education Statistics (NCES) announced that it will include data measuring food security and homelessness of postsecondary students in the 2019-20 National Postsecondary Student Aid Study.

The National Assessment Governing Board released a 10-year plan designed to streamline and reduce costs associated with the National Assessment of Education Progress (NAEP). The plan would eliminate assessments in arts, geography, and economics and cancel planned NAEP expansions in foreign language and in 12th grade technology and engineering tests.

On Monday, July 29, ED will publish a notice for a 30-day public comment period in the Federal Register on its proposal to establish an Opportunity Zones priority for discretionary grant programs.

GRANT OPPORTUNITIES 

Penn Hill Group provides a list of grant opportunities and summaries for select grants. Please visit our website for more information.